By Oyeyinka Fabowale
Sunny Side of Midnight, a novel by renowned journalist and Editor, Saturday Sun Newspaper, Tope Adeboboye, is the story of Nigeria. Crammed into and glinting off its 368 pages are, not unexpected, the hardly good and mostly bad and ugly images of the diverse aspects of the Nigerian society – from politics, governance, official corruption, nepotism to religious charlatanism, systemic inefficiency, dysfunctional educational system, urban crises and squalor to infrastructural deficit and decay. The picture unfolds and is mirrored in the main narrative, the story of Adaba, a young, brilliant graduate whose life is dogged and buffeted by personal vicissitudes that hampered and almost frustrated his progress.
Graduating atop of his class he could not secure a decent employment but watches his less smart schoolmates do well financially, settled in businesses – legitimate and illegitimate or well-paying jobs, procured, in some cases, by hook or crook. He lost a premium executive position in the corporate office of a leading firm in the fictitious country of Anija (read Nigeria) to a girl who neither applied for nor attended the job interview in which he, Adaba had emerged the best candidate. The girl who, coincidentally, was Adaba’s classmate in the university, got the job for being the girlfriend to a politician with influence in the company.
Besides this humiliating and distressing experience, the protagonist, a professing Pentecostal Christian, suffers series of tragedies including accidents, arrest, missed opportunities, deprivation and depression that all make him lose faith and to attempt suicide. His rescue by Say Parry, a middle-age loner who has had his own share of life’s topsy-turvy, and his encounter with Chief Julius Laka, the Chief Priest of Okiripampa, a local albeit reputed deity, marks a turning point in his fate. But this is not to be immediately evident. In fact, his woes seem to multiply as, in desperation, he sought spiritual solutions to his predicament both from the deity’s shrine and a church pastor.
Adaba’s case raises fundamental questions about certain existential issues and happenings in the life of man that baffle and perplex. What, for instance, lies behind the unequal and apparently arbitrary and unjust award of luck and fluctuating circumstances among men? Why do seemingly bad people thrive and the good ones suffer? Are there truly mortal beings or unseen forces, benign or evil, vengeful or vindictive, malicious or merely mischievous capable of manipulating how men fare on earth? Despite the author’s valiant attempt to explaining them in the denouement, however, these questions still hang in the air unresolved. The narrative, however, gives the reader enough to think about, develop fortitude and to fortify his faith in the Love and Goodness of the Almighty Creator for His creatures.
However, not without, first, inducing him, particularly if he were a believer in God (Christian), to critically re-examine some of the present-day doctrinal teachings and practices with regard to their propriety, validity and conformity to the fundament of the creed. In the end, much of them are revealed as caricatures and distortions of the original order or teachings stemming from ignorance or deliberate ploy by religious leaders to control and exploit their gullible followers for commercial and other selfish gains.
Adeboboye adroitly highlights these falsities with uncanny wit and humour without profaning the sacred tenets. An example was the severe whipping Adaba got from Prophet Jeff and his assistant, Evangelist Jeru, in the name of exorcising demons alleged to inhabit his body and thus hindering his ‘breakthrough’!
The author does not disappoint as a prose stylist in this book. He is intense and vivid in his depiction of the physical environment as in his probing and revelation of the hearts of his characters. His descriptions are graphic and compelling. He virtually takes the reader to explore and experience with him the inner and outer consciousness and experiences. He relieves familiar scenes albeit in a most dramatic and evocative way. Chief Julius’ standoff with policemen extorting motorists at an illegal police checkpoint probably illustrates this best. The cops, upon recognizing the traditional icon, did what they normally would to save them from the repercussions of offending a VIP or possibly having their illegal act reported: they apologized, backed off and bolted from the scene, leaving other hapless, detained motorists confused and to disperse one after the other in relief.
This is one book that reminds so much of Cyprian Ekwensi in diagnosis and dissection of urban life and ills, highlighting the contrasts between beautiful and serene nature and the loud and ugly city slums, what he calls “the riot and rot”. The reader can easily relate with the graphic picture of the typical Lagos traffic chaos that defies control. In this particular scene, the traffic warden looks beaten by the reckless driving of motorists and just looks on resignedly or forlornly and without care. (Page 154). It is to be noted that his negligence, incompetence, indifference or chase for bribe by transporters caused the bedlam in part or in whole in the first instance.
The novel also transports the reader to the United States, Minneapolis and Minnesota, drawing parallels between lifestyles of people of ‘low life’ in the two countries or indeed anywhere in the world. The comic punching incident between the dwarf man and his weird hulky seductress-turned puncher in a clubhouse looks, for instance, just like a scene straight from an American screen blockbuster!
For a debutante, Adeboboye’s art commendably aspires to the prowess of accomplished novelists in the remarkable way he embedded both didactic and satirical comments as a matter of course in virtually every line of the text without disrupting the flow of the narrative. This technique served in form of direct, critical commentaries, allusions and anecdotes, enables the reader to savour the pleasure and quality of both genres of serious and popular fiction.
Lots of symbolisms, images and tropes here – woven into the names of characters, places and in the depiction of situations. The novelist also employs foreshadowing as a technique to anticipate impending events and enable the reader appreciate their deeper significance and/or interconnectedness in relation to the main narrative. The novel opens with a scary prelude akin to Michael Jackson’s horror musical film, ‘Thriller’, that ominously foreshadows the ordeals that await Adaba in the book. He is relentlessly chased by a strange, burly and coarse armed man. Just when he thinks he has escaped with the treasure for which his pursuer is after him, the man suddenly steals over and demands he give it up. A bitter struggle ensues in which his adversary snatches the ‘prize’ and pummels him into helpless unconsciousness from which he only awakes to find himself inside his bedroom!
Also, persons aware that words in Yoruba, as a tonal language, are subject to a variety of meanings are likely to appreciate that Adaba bears a name that is subject to two possible interpretations. It can imply ‘contrived affliction’ or ‘dove’, symbolic of peace! The story’s ending suggests that the twin paradoxical meanings are valid as Adaba ultimately survives the torrent of suffering and misery and lands a dream job with a happy love relationship with Shakira to look forward to. Not before Adeboboye has almost shocked the reader with another tragic twist in which Adaba was hit and almost killed by a vehicle after resuming his new dream job; only to take us on a long suspenseful excursion to the United States to follow the life of Chief Julius who, on hearing of Adaba’s accident, felt betrayed by his patron-god, which has assured him that the worst is over for the young man. He has rashly resigned his office as Chief Priest of Okiripampa and travelled to re-join his wife and children whom he had abandoned along with his job as a university professor, to honour his community’s summon to take custody and oversee the heritage of Okiripampa’s priesthood.
Light or the restoration of it weeks after the electric distribution company that succeeded the notorious National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) cut off epileptic power supply to Say Parry’s neighbourhood and simple affair such as a cranky room fan working and providing breeze in his room after he had rescued and brought suicidal Adaba with him to his house also become powerful symbolisms and imagery of reprieve – indicating the beginning of a positive shift from the protagonist’s state of disillusionment to that of hope and promise.
Though straightforward with little complicated twists, the narration is so well -paced and intriguing, it keeps the reader impatiently turning the pages.
Adeboboye’s power of description and as a poet is all just too evident in this satirical work able to make the list of recommended literature text for schools and compete favourably for literary awards/prizes, to which the author is no stranger.