Soyinka is a very respecting and even shy person, who has pain in intruding into other people's spaces without cause. He has no patience for indolence and parochialism, even though some times in the past I have myself criticized him for being myopic in the ways that he had lumped up the North for blame for the Nigerian problems (read the Open Sore of a Nation, for example). After personally interacting with him I understood him better, and saw that his goals are not usually to segregate when he criticizes the Nigerian leadership and often he selects very complex metaphors that need closer scrutiny to understand. That Soyinka is all over Nigeria today to speak forcefully on behalf of the common person, from Sokoto to Port Hacourt, to Osogbo, is an evidence of his being above pettiness. I will, of course, even at this age advise him to get to know more the diverse communities and the peoples of Northern Nigeria and appreciate Islam and the Islamic civilization, its history and Arabic cum Hausa-Fulani literacy as developed in the northern part of Nigeria. What is certain is that Soyinka has an unapologetic belief in the ability of Africa to modernize from within and does not think any foreign culture is superior to Africa's. I happened to think that Death and the King's Horseman, and The Lion and the Jewel, are two plays where Soyinka made important political statements to the World about the intrinsic power of Africa to develop beyond any person's expectation if it is allowed to grow from within.