Nwazuluwa Onuekwuke "Zulu" Sofola (22 June 1935 – 5 September 1995)[1] was the first published femaleNigerian playwright and dramatist.[2] Sofola was also a university teacher and became the first female Professor of Theater Arts inAfrica.[3]
Nwazuluwa Onuekwuke Sofola[4] was born in the formerBendel State to Nwaugbade Okwumabua and Chief Ogana Okwumabua who wereIgbo fromIssele-Uku,Aniocha North Local Government Area, presentlyDelta State in the south-southern region ofNigeria. She attended Federal Government Primary School inAsaba and the Baptist Girls High School inAgbor all in Delta State.[citation needed] Due to her outstanding performance in school, she was awarded a scholarship to complete her high school education inNashville, Tennessee.[5][failed verification] Spending her adolescence and early womanhood in the US, she studied atSouthern Baptist Seminary, earned a BA in English atVirginia Union University in Richmond, Virginia in 1959.[citation needed] She obtained her MA in Drama (Play writing and Production) fromThe Catholic University of America in Washington DC in the year 1965.[1] She returned to Nigeria in 1966, and became a lecturer in the Department of Theatre Arts at theUniversity of Ibadan,Oyo State, where she obtained a PhD in Theatre Arts (Tragic Theory) in 1977.[6]
Her plays "range from historical tragedy to domestic comedy and use both traditional and modernAfrican setting".[7] She uses "elements ofmagic, myth andritual to examine conflicts between traditionalism and modernism in which male supremacy persists."[8] She was considered one of the most distinguished women inNigerian literature.[9]She remains a source of inspiration to young African writers.Sofola's most frequently performed plays areWedlock of the Gods (1972) andThe Sweet Trap (1977).[8] She died in 1995 at the age of 60.
Ezenwamadu, Nkechi Judith, and Chinyere Theodora Ojiakor. "Proverbs and Postproverbial Stance in Selected Plays ofEmeka Nwabueze and Zulu Sofola."Matatu 51, no. 2 (2020): 432–447.
^ab"Sofola, Zulu", in Martin Banham, Errol Hill & George Woodyard (eds),The Cambridge Guide to African & Caribbean Theatre, Cambridge University Press, 1994; p. 82.
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