*PROF. WOLE SOYINKA AT 90: A GALA OF HIGH COMMENDATIONS AND DISSECTIONS*
On Friday July 13, 1934, contrasting events unfolded around the world. Far away in Europe, Adolf Hitler launched the “Night of Long Knives” in Germany, causing great global unease and rapple. But in British West Africa, a bouncing baby boy, later named Akinwande Oluwole Babatunde Soyinka, was born in Abeokuta, in the hear of Yorubaland, , amidst jubilation. Today, that infant boy, Akinwande Oluwole Babatunde Soyinka has acquired several sobriquets and nom-de-guerre, depending on the circumstance. On his 90th birthday, he has severally been given such by-names as “Kongi”, the “Lion of African Literature”, the “Bard of Ogun” and the “Sage of Abeokuta” (right from his hometown). Others refer to him as the “Literary Giant of Africa”, “Poet Laurette of the Black World”, The “Champion of Justice...