Untitled - Memorial University of Newfoundland

Notice that the carrier takes all the collective evils of the whole society symbolically
and psychologically in his person . The carrier or scapegoat always operates on behalf
of the whole community. In "Tiger on Stage: Wole Soyinka and Nigerian Theatre,"
Femi Osofisan argues that Soyinka's thematic concern in his plays rests in his belief
that society seasonally accumulates a burdenof guilt that can only be purged through
the shedding of blood:
For Soyinka this process equates to nothing less than a tragic cycle ­
firstly . in the notion of prerequisite destruction and violence before the
advent of rain and harvest. and secondly. because this harvest, in order
to be at its most fecund, must first feed on a ritual victim. taken from
the society's strongest stock. That scapegoat, especially in societies
where the burden is hereditary , continuously fascinates Scyinka,
becoming for him the most palpable incarnation of our tragic fate .. .
(163) .
Soyinka superimposes iris own theory of tragic fate. different from that of Aristotle's.
on to the action. The tragedy here is not merely an "imitation of actions arousing fear
and pity" nor is it the change in the tragic hero's misfortune from happiness to misery
caused by "some error on his part" (XU I) . On the contrary, the cathartic experience
in Soyinka's dramatic theory is worked out through the re-enactment of Ogun's rite of
passage as he makes the transition through the primordial jungle where the tragic
transformation takes place, resulting in purgation and purification. rejuvenation and
renewal for the individual and the community; hamartia and/or the tragic flaw are not
essential. Agave sacrifices her son and in the recognition scene when Cadmus asks
"why us?- she responds "why not?- Agave accepts her role as priestess of the hunt
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