This document provides character summaries for the play "The Swamp Dwellers" by Wole Soyinka. It describes the main characters including Alu, Makuri, Awuchike, Igwezu, Desala, Kadiye, and The Beggar. For each character it provides key details about their role, background, and significance to the themes of the play.
1. ● Department of English
● Name: Pandya Dharmishtha D.
● Roll No. 22
● Paper- 14 (African literature)
● Topic : Character study of 'Swamp
Dwellers'
● Submitted by – Dr. Dilip Barad
M.K. Bhavnagar University
2. About Author
Auther, Playwright and
poet
Auther, Playwright and
poet
Nobel Prize in Literature
(1986)
Nobel Prize in Literature
(1986)
NigerianNigerian
First African awarded from
New Literature
First African awarded from
New Literature
“Even when I am writing plays I enjoy
having company and mentally I think
of thet company as the company
I am writhing for”
- Wole Soyinka
“Even when I am writing plays I enjoy
having company and mentally I think
of thet company as the company
I am writhing for”
- Wole Soyinka
3. Alu
● Alu is the wife of Makuri. She is the mother of
Igwezu and Awuchike. She is agedabout sixty.
● She believes in the custome of the swamps. She
thinks that the river bed is the ideal bridal bed. She
has more concern for Awuchike who is in the city.
She has anxiety for his safety.
● Alu's understanding of the world is very limited.
Igwezu's words about her brother Awuchike set her
anxiety at rest. All said, Alu is a loving and a
loveable mother.
4. Makuri
● Makuri is the father of Igwezu and Awuchike.
● He is the husband of Alu. As a husband he is
concited. He is fond of teasing his wife. His
continuous bickering with his wife is only a show.
He has perfect mutual understanding with his wife.
He is a good host. He offers canebrew to the beggar.
● He represnts the note of trsdition in the play. His
affection for his wife is unsentimental. He is more
intalligent than his wife. Makuri feel soffended over
it.
5. Awuchike
● Awuchike is the twin brother of Igwezu.
● He does not appear as a character in the play. It is through telling
Soyinka portrays the character of Awuchike.
● Ten year ago he left the swamp. The glamour of city life has changed his
character. He has become a total city dweller.
● He is in timber business. Money making carries him off his feet. He is
not a man of fair dealing.
● Doing business in city has made him ruthless and heartless. He goes to
the extent of taking Desala from his brother Igwezu.
● He is a betrayer. He examplifies the statement “city turns brother against
brother.”
6. Igwezu
● Igwezu is the son of Alu and Makuri. He is twin with Awuchike.
● He is the centre of the play. The Swamp Dwellers is a drama of
revalation and Igwezu gets education through experience both in
the city and inthe swamp.
● Igwezu's discovery of the deficiencies of the village life and the
city life constitutes the primary thematic content of the play.
● He is a character in the play who has tasted the ups and downs of
life both in the village and city.
● As a swamp dwellers he knows how life goes in the southern
part of Nigeria. In that aspect, Igwezu is unlike his brother
Awuchike, a city dweller.
7. ● He is a brock in business. He comes back home. His
land is flooded. His hope of getting a good harvest is
blasted. He is betrayed by his own brother, Desala, his
wife betrayshim, she changes hand.
● Igwezu has a frank talk with Kadiye.
● Igwezu welcome modernizationto the swamp. He is
ready fora change mind.
● Igwezu's experience of life, both in the city and in the
village disillusion. He reflects critically on his
situation.
● He desides to entrust the land to the beggar. He
rejected the beggar's help beacause he does not like
one blind man leading another.
8. Desala
● Desala does not appear in the play as a character.
But, she is spoken off. Desala is the embodiment of
the corrupt nature of the city life.
● Desala marries Igwezu. Igwezu later becomes poor
owing to bad returns from his business.
● Desala found Awuchike prospering in his business.
So, Desala leaves Igwezu and marries Awuchike.
● It show how city life has become morally void.
9. Kadiye
● He is a man of self-importance. As the priest of the serpent
he fleeces the swamp dwellers.
● In physical appearance Kadiye is a contrast to the beggar.
● He is bulky. His fingers are heavily ringed. He is prosperous
in the midst of poverty.
● He betrays the trust of the villagers. He encourages the
serpent cult.
● He has set eye on igwazy's money. As a priest he is not
bothered about Igwezu's lot.
● Soyinka satirizes the corrupt practices all the society living
in superstition through Kadiye.
10. The Beggar
● The Beggar comes from Bukanji in North Nigeria. He is tall and straight.
His bearing is dignified.
● He is devout Muslim. He is a man of independence. He is resolute in
suporting himself. Though is blind he is veru good jugde of other
character in the play.
● Soyinka has drawn him as a contrast to kadiya. Though he has seen
adversity it has not shaken his spirits. He is full of hope.
● He is for redeeming a piece land for cultivation from the swamp.
● He is a man of quik intelligence. He analyzes the ill of the swamp
dwellers. He is ready to cast his lot with them.
● It is an irony that the man from the north is termed as beggar. He may be
a beggar beacuse he does not have means to support him. But his
intention is to work and earn his livilihood. He is against getting ailms.
● His self-esteem does not allows him to beg. The Beggar is a man of self-
esteem.
