He stopped Elesin from killing him self in the sacred ritual of the Yoruba culture.
"Death and the King's Horseman" is a play by Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka. The characters Death and the King's Horseman hold significant symbolic roles within the story. Death is a personification of fate and the afterlife, while the King's Horseman, Elesin, is a respected figure responsible for carrying out rituals upon a king's death to ensure a peaceful transition to the afterlife. The play explores themes of culture clash, duty, and the inevitable clash between tradition and modernity.
Elesin is the main character of "Death and the King's Horseman" because he embodies the central conflict of the play between traditional Yoruba beliefs and Western colonial influence. His role as the King's Horseman also ties him directly to the ritual suicide that forms the climax of the play, making him the focal point of the narrative. Elesin's inner struggles and his interactions with other characters drive the plot forward and highlight the themes of duty, honor, and cultural clash.
his duty is to take care of his people.
Olunde is the son of Elesin, horseman to the King. Elesin has lead a good life, beloved of his people but neglects to fulfil his duty to the Yoruban people by comitting ritual suicice after his King's death. Olunde has been sent abroad by the Pilkings (English colonisers) to become a doctor. Previously to the play Elesin has disowned his son. However, as Olunde points out disowning is not the same in Yoruban culture, Olunde will always be a part of Yoruban life, he will always be part of the rituals and traditions, it is his birthright and his duty. He is therefore shamed when he arrives home to bury his father and discovers that he has not fulfilled his end of the bargain. So Olunde sacrifices himself to prevent dishonour upon his family and to restore the world order. Olunde seems to represent the fluid movement of Yoruban culture. Soyinka does not present this culture as static, lost in time, a culture that does not develop (Olunde recieives a telegram about the impending death of his father from someone in the village, this shocks the Pilkings who didn't think the 'savages' could do such things!) instead Soyinka shows that Yoruban life changes according to the time, but that this does not effect their world view. Olunde has to kill himself to ensure that the passage between the Ancestors and the Living stays open but also to ensure that the colonisers do not win in their attemots to quell Yoruban rituals and interpretations of life. The whole text becomes a struggle for meaning, which Olunde ironically wins in death. Western literary theory would have us believe that once the text is consumed by the market place, the author is dead and the meaning can be toyed with by any reader. However in Yoruban culture the meaning of the ritual text is solidifed by the death of the author/auteur.
Was to carry out religious rituals
To carry out religious ceremonies to please the gods.
The horseman yelled to the colonel to not forget that box of cigars.
The king 's chief duty was to carry out religious ceremonies to please the gods.
to make sure that that the army, irrigation systems where doing good
No.
no
Yes