Biyi Bandele’s Theatre of the Afropolitan Absurd

Abstract

This chapter initiates an overdue discussion of Bandele’s early plays Marching for Fausa (Royal Court, 1993), Two Horsemen (The Gate, 1994), and Resurrections in the Season of the Longest Drought (Cochrane, 1994). It examines these plays through two distinct but related lenses. For classification purposes, the plays are situated within the tradition of the African Absurd. They are then analysed through the transnational concept of Afropolitanism. Although the plays predate the term Afropolitan, this chapter demonstrates how the concept’s articulation of globalised African identities and cultures provides an ideal framework through which to comprehend the complex conditions of their production and the political and cultural issues with which they engage.