Ogboinba is a mythical sorceress who appears in the folklore of the Ijo (Ijaw) people of Nigeria. She is noted for attempting to use her supernatural powers to challenge Woyengi, the supreme deity of the Ijo, into changing her chosen fate of childlessness. While escaping Woyengi's anger, she enters the eyes of a pregnant woman, and remains trapped there.[1][2] The Ijo say that when you look into the eyes of another person, it is Ogboinba who looks back at you.
In literature
editThe story of Ogboinba has been adapted and discussed by several Nigerian writers. In the play Woyengi by Obotunde Ijimere (a pseudonym for Ulli Beier), Ogboinba appears as the antagonist, coming into conflict with powerful spirits in her quest to change her fate.[3] Isidore Okpewho expands on the traditional motifs of the myth in his book Myth in Africa.[4] Titus-Green notes that the myth of Ogboinba hiding in the eyes of every person, represents the potential for greed and inordinate ambition that exists in each person.[5]
References
edit- ^ "Woyengi | West African Ijo Deity & Mythology | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
- ^ "Ogboinba and the Creation Stone". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
- ^ Okeke, Tochukwu J. (2022). "COSTUME DESIGN FOR THEATRE PRODUCTIONS: FROM CONCEPT TO REALIZATION: A CASE STUDY OF THE PRODUCTION OF OBOTUNDE IJIMERE'S WOYENGI". Ama: Journal of Theatre and Cultural Studies. 16.
- ^ Barber, Karin (July 1986). "Isidore Okpewho, Myth in Africa: a study of its aesthetic and cultural relevance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983, 305 pp., £20.00, 0 521 24554 0". Africa. 56 (3): 370–371. doi:10.2307/1160699. ISSN 1750-0184. JSTOR 1160699. S2CID 148390191.
- ^ Titus-Green, Atamunobarabinye Jonathan (2020). Drama and philosophy: a study of selected texts within the Ijaw oral tradition (phd thesis). SOAS University of London. doi:10.25501/soas.00035351.