Photo Caption: Prof Emeritus Funso Aiyejina. – Photo courtesy the NGC Bocas Lit Fest
We have lost a giant. We have lost a force. His absence will be felt, memory cherished, achievements amplified, and spirit celebrated
By Yvonne Webb
FORMER dean of Humanities and Education and Professor Emeritus at UWI Funso Aiyejina has died.
The Nigerian-born Aiyejina was also a poet, short-story writer and playwright.
Tributes have started pouring in from his contemporaries and those he worked with in the literary field.
Among them, former UWI principal Brian Copeland spoke of the brilliance of the man with whom he shared a lot of ideas about UWI going forward.
“I am still trying to gather my thoughts. This one hit me hard. I thought he was in good health.
“He was a strong African but loved TT, which he made his home for over 30 years. He was married to a Trinidadian, Lynda, and had two brilliant sons of whom he was very proud,” Copeland said.
He said Aiyejina closely followed African traditions and would disappear around Carnival to check out all the stickfights and all Yoruba traditions in TT (though he was not himself Yoruba).
Founder of the Bocas Lit Fest and Newsday columnist Marina Salandy-Brown said, “We have lost a most loyal and wonderful friend and a steadfast partner.”
She spoke of the painful process of announcing the sudden death of this founding Bocas board member.
“He attended our AGM on Thursday and the book launch that followed and was his usual upbeat self.
“He played a critical role in the development of the Slam and our publishing efforts and sealed our long-term relationship with UWI, where he was dean of the Faculty of Education and the Humanities,” she said.
“We have lost a most loyal and wonderful friend and a steadfast partner. He believed in the Bocas vision and dream and was tireless in his contributions to our work.
“He made many other interventions to promote literature in our region. Himself a prizewinning writer, he was also a scholar who was the authority on the work of Earl Lovelace, (and) he was a UWI Press editor for very many years.
“He led the Cropper Foundation residential workshops that trained so many of our contemporary writers. He also started the MFA at UWI St Augustine.
“I know everyone who knew him and worked with him will know the extent of our loss, personal and professional. My heart is with yours as we mourn his untimely passing. We are all devastated, bereft, shocked and speechless in the face of this sudden loss. Everyone loved and deeply appreciated him as a friend and mentor. He was always honest and generous”
Salandy-Brown added, “For me personally, he had a special place outside of work. My mother too was born in Nigeria, and he talked to her about their birthplace and he translated the remnants of the Hausa she still remembered. He was a link with her past. She adored him.”
The Strictly Soca Facebook page commented: “We have lost a giant. We have lost a force. His absence will be felt, memory cherished, achievements amplified, and spirit celebrated.
“Travel well, my friend, and Godspeed.”
AIYEJINA was born in 1949 in Ososo, Edo State, Nigeria, graduated from the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), Acadia University, and UWI.
He taught at Obafemi Awolowo University and UWI, and was a Fulbright lecturer in creative writing at Lincoln University, Missouri.
He also served as deputy festival director of the NGC Bocas Lit Fest. In 2022, he and Merle Hodge won the Bocas Henry Swanzy Award for Distinguished Service to Caribbean Letters.
Aiyejina was a James Michener Fellow of the Caribbean Writers Summer Institute, University of Miami, and an honorary fellow of the International Writers Workshop, Hong Kong Baptist University.
******
An elegy for Professor Funso Aiyejina...
AS human beings, we are a very curious bunch. Some of us bounce our big toe and want the whole universe to know, and others like my Professor walked around carrying a bag, heavy with accolades, normal-normal like it was nobody’s business. I met Professor Aiyejina more than two decades ago, after he had already won the Commonwealth Prize for Literature, which was and is a very big deal…
And when I asked him what that felt like, he responded that when he told his children they could hardly be bothered, and he decided that they were right. Now, this was not that fake/performative humility that Trinidadians love so much, but rather the genuine vibe of a very bright man who was as keen on producing written excellence as he was on not falling into that trap of taking himself too seriously…
I had the distinct honour and privilege of being his student at the University and then later a colleague. And when a few years later that restlessness struck me and I contemplated leaving for unknown waters, as a mentor, his was one of the handful of opinions I sought. Exemplary, an exemplar, a brilliant lecturer, thinker and writer and though born on the Continent, a lover and believer in all things Trinidad and Tobago, we have truly lost a titan…
May he forever sleep in peace…
Bless.
https://web.facebook.com/lovell.francis
*****
…We lost a force, a giant
WE have lost a giant. We have lost a force. His absence will be felt, memory cherished, achievements amplified, and spirit celebrated.
Travel well, my friend, and Godspeed
Funṣọ Aiyejina, born in 1949 in Ososo, Edo State, Nigeria, graduated from the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), Acadia University, and UWI. He taught at Obafemi Awolowo University and UWI, and was a Fulbright Lecturer in Creative Writing at Lincoln University, Missouri. He also served as Deputy Festival Director of the NGC Bocas Lit Fest.
In 2022, Funṣọ and Merle Hodge won the Bocas Henry Swanzy Award for Distinguished Service to Caribbean Letters.
He is a James Michener Fellow of the Caribbean Writers Summer Institute, University of Miami, and an Honorary Fellow of the International Writers Workshop, Hong Kong Baptist University. He co-facilitates the Cropper Foundation Residential Writers Workshop and is Emeritus Professor at UWI, St. Augustine.
His poetry and short stories have been published in international journals and anthologies like The Anchor Book of African Stories, Literature Without Borders, The New African Poetry, and The Penguin Book of Modern African Poetry. His works have been dramatized on radio in Nigeria and England.
He won the Association of Nigerian Authors’ Poetry Prize in 1989 for his first poetry book, ‘A Letter to Lynda and Other Poems’. His first fiction book, ‘The Legend of the Rockhills and Other Stories’, won Best First Book (Africa) at the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, 2000. Reviewing his 2004 poetry collection, ‘I, The Supreme and Other Poems’, Jennifer Rahim noted his focus on the historical, cultural, and political life of Africa and its diaspora.
Funṣọ is a noted critic of African and West Indian literature and culture. He has worked extensively on Earl Lovelace’s writing, editing ‘A Place in the World: Essays and Tributes in Honour of Earl Lovelace @ 70’ and ‘Earl Lovelace: Growing in the Dark (Selected Essays)’, and authoring the biography ‘Earl Lovelace’. He also edited ‘Self-Portrait: Interviews with Ten West Indian Writers and Two Critics’ and co-edited ‘Caribbean Literature in a Global Context’.
******
…I have only fond memories
SUCH sad, shocking news last evening
Sigh.
I have only fond memories of Prof Funso Aiyejina from my undergrad days at UWI in the 1990s. Class sessions with him were enlightening and dynamic. Without forcing it he nurtured an interesting in further exploration of topics and issues as well as lifelong learning. He also told me I could write encouraged me to do so.
After graduating, I was surprised when some years later he called me by name. I made out that distinctive accent anywhere. He laughed when I expressed surprise that he not only remembered me, but also my whole long name. He never passed me straight in our random encounters.
He was also humble.
I remember when he carved out time for me from his busy schedule as Dean and provided solid advice when I contemplated a number of postgraduate options.
I also remember him slipping in to sit next to me at a Professorial lecture. I told him, “You need to go down to the front with the other specially invited guests”. He laughed and still sat at the back. His witty, jovial, comments had me stiflng laughter.
That this brilliant, energetic, affable, witty, indomitable, versatile, on-the-move persona is suddenly silent is surreal.
Gone, soon, but his impact is left.
Comfort and condolences to the family.
Rahim, Rohelhr now Aiyejina …
https://web.facebook.com/petrona.strachan
