Semantic Absurdities and Social Vision in Jared Angira's Poetry: Poetry From Africa Nudging The Proletariat to Rise Up And Stand on Their Own Two Feet

In Semantic Absurdities and Vision in Jared Angira's Poetry, Bwocha has made an incisive analysis of the ubiquitous contradictions inherent in Kenyan prolific poet Jared Angira’s poetry. It emerges as a keen commentary on the sly politicians who resemble Browning's Mayor in'The Pied Piper of Hamelin' for they end up brainwashing the youth into believing they will reap from their sweat only for them to realize politicians' ploys result in violent implosions witnessed during and after national elections, the imbroglio making Kenya, any Africa a shadow of her former self. In the poems, Bwocha has keenly observed that Angira writes with passion and flamboyance in language, which sometimes brings him out as an elusive poet whose import is hard to make out. The language Angira uses, which Bwocha has designated 'semantically absurd' makes the poems exciting and curiosity whetting. Angira talks of ‘voices trapped in between despair and existence’ for which he works to give a voice while at the same predicting a future when these oppressed masses will revolt: 'But the coal in the store/Is black; deadly black/No one knows of a chemical property/That works it up/Red to the flame'....

Bwocha Nyagemi was born in Nyamira County, Kenya in 1978. He has been writing both poetry and prose from his high school days in Nyansiongo to his stints at Kenyatta University where he graduated with a B.Ed Honors in 2002 and later an MA in Literature in 2008. He is a teacher/scholar currently pursuing his D.Phil. in Literature at Moi University