Femi Morgan & Kehinde Folorunsho
Mark Nwagwu’s Curved Fortunes is a deeply moving anthology on the paradox of love. It derives its insight from the balance exerted on the extant issues foremost on the mind of the postmodernist poet. Although there is a marginal dilution of the subject with personal expressions, the insight engages the reader’s sense of realism. This then follows that the focal themes of the poems create a comprehensive discussion in the reader’s mind. With close attention to the style, language and unique deployment of elements of form, Nwagwu’s Curved Fortunes is a work of wit, devotion, and meditation.
On the front of its textual value is the sequence of the subjects raised. It segues smoothly from cultural lore to social anxiety. Within that purview, Nwagwu raises a range of concern over transition phases. It is deducible from his argument that tradition – in matters of humanist essence – protrudes even into our most urgent disposition towards social changes. That in turn creates numerous accounts – both personal and shared – of anxiety. In essence, the movement is a fine transpose of the poet’s interrogation of a society fast adapting to post-cultural dilemma.
The implications are inexhaustible. Within the context of that social consciousness, Nwagwu expounds on the cultures that have created the modern society. Therefore, a fascination with the past is confronted with the creativity of the present. In style, form, and content, Curved Fortunes examines the capacity for a viable modernism. It reads on one hand as a lamentation and the persona’s discontent; on the other, it explores how the individual is a deciding factor in the consequences. As such, it is a personal reflection on the socio-cultural ambition of modern society, left to the reader to unearth.
On another note, the influence of personal encounters is pressing in the work. Nwagwu spills a poignant observation from the persona’s inner world. By reminiscing on his African origin, the persona apprehends a purpose deeply rooted in a responsibility to his homeland. And in that regard, the poems pass for a lyric of vision whereby the poet makes an appraisal of inherent forces of transformation. It is plausible to find it a nostalgic rendition of transition phases. The depth, as it will be discovered, transcends that experiential narrative: it is a dialogue about the future, written from the affluence of ordeals.
Again, Curved Fortunes is ablaze with the modernist expression. The language is as accessible as profound. While the themes move between cultural sensibility and social angst, the expressiveness cuts across the texture of the subject matters. That is, it is both interesting and engaging to read a contemporary use of language capture the dynamics of the poetic impulse. It goes further to depict the deviation from a burdening norm. By this, it is meant that the language features a relatedness to the quotidian style of communication. However, it still maintains the poetic tradition of unique intelligibility. Engagement with the poems on the literary level is sure to produce a spontaneous effect of artistic experience.
Consequently, the themes underscored in the anthology are lived experiences of the conscious post-modernist. It sparks a rhetoric of folk lore, existence, social interventions, growth, love, and angst. Needless to say that the themes pass for two iconic premises. The first – with various subsidiaries – is a reflection on identity. Tangential to its age long discussion as a crisis, Curved Fortunes treats identity with a deep nostalgic feeling. It addresses matters of beauty, appraisal, and functionality in the cultural tropes. It examines the enchantment of viable Africanism. Although it does not expressly open itself up for criticism as a Pan-Africanist discourse, Curved Fortunes retains the elements of immediacy in such consciousness. Allusions to the indigenous sites of folklore therefore underpins a poetic ethos in African poesy: homecoming. The transfusion of foreign culture in Nwagwu’s work only deviates from the norm of projecting the African as a ‘victim’; rather, this work identifies him as one charting the course of his own indestructible civilisation.
The second premise is manifestly related to the civilisation in practice. It is none other than the numerous issues of sociatal dilemma. It delves into the conflict engendered within as a result of failed social expectations. It is a personal life angst steeped in the overreaching effects of a lost society. Just like the deviation in the first premise, this other premise also differs in arguments with the preponderance of political culture in this anxiety. Even though it is not entirely absent, Nwagwu does not base the discontent in that outlook. Rather, the poems produce a nudge towards the urgent need for changes. This remains indefinite until the conscious reader explores the wit by which the dilemma is addressed. The creative diligence invested in this anthology thus provides the basis for its reading as an authentic work of art. Its discussion is as clear as the poems themselves are contemporary and relevant.
In tone and mood, Curved Fortunes can be situated in the context of an innermost quest for meaning. It ponders life as spiral entity that curves different worlds inwards. It is meditative in tone. The persona views his immediate world as a sequence of transformation – from tradition to modernity – that leaves him looking back for an interpretation of a human predicament. In so doing, he banks on the intersection of his identity and his ordeals – of course, a universal subject in itself. All is left for the reader to settle within themself as a matter of credibility. The mood is meditation. All that goes on in the poet’s world is a dilemma. A change that is inevitable and one that is inadvertent. It is thus brilliant that the poems raise curiosity in the reader.
Finally, this anthology leaves much to understand about the contemporariness of African poetry. From language to subjects, it is a deviation from the rigid hold of poetic expression to re-imagine possibilities that are yet to be lyricised in the patriot’s ethical dilemma.
Femi Morgan is a writer, poet and communications expert. He was the youngest permanent member of the PUNCH editorial board. He was shortlisted for the 2021 Glena Luschei Prize for African Poetry.
Kehinde Folorunsho s a writer, critic and storyteller. He is also an active member of culture organizations, Artmosphere and Griots and Bards.
Mark Nwagwu is a reknowned professor of cellular biology. He is a fellow of the Nigeria Academy of Science, a fellow of the Association of Nigerian Authors. He returned to the University of Ibadan as a PhD student at the Institute of African Studies.
First Published on BookArtVille
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