Ola Rotimi

Ola Rotimi,  a Nigerian playwright and director born April 13, 1938 in Sapele, Nigeria and died August 18, 2000, Ife-Ife, Nigeria, was trained in the Western theatre tradition but incorporated into his predominately English-language plays traditional Nigerian cultural forms, including ethnicdances and indigenous languages.

His works often presented figures or incidents of historical importance in Nigeria in an effort to highlight the relevance of the past to contemporary issues. A Nigerian government scholarship took Rotimi in 1959 to the United States, where he studied fine arts at Boston University and writing at the school of drama at Yale University. While at Boston and Yale, he wrote his first two plays, To Stir the God of Iron (1963) and Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again (1966). After earning a master's degree from Yale, Rotimi returned to Nigeria, lecturing first at what became Obafemi Awolowo University in Ife-Ife and later at the University of Port Harcourt.

During this time, he wrote several plays, including the acclaimed The Gods Are Not to Blame (1968), a retelling of the Oedipus story; Ovonramwen Nogbaisi (1971), about the last ruler of the Benin empire; and Hopes of the Living Dead (1985), which recounted Nigerian choral composer Ikoli Harcourt Whyte's fight for equal rights for lepers. Rotimi had taught at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn., until he returned home to Nigeria shortly before his death.