Death And The King's Horseman

Death and the King’s Horseman provokes many thoughts about the outcome and why these events took place in the play. I believe that the play is more about the destruction of the culture rather than just the destruction of an individual. Elesin had a very big decision to make during the play and he made his decision too late. As the king’s horseman, his choice was either to kill himself so he could serve his king in the afterlife, as the ancient native tradition was, or stay alive and live out life as a normal person. He ended up killing himself while in chains but it was too late because Olunde, Elesin’s son, sacrificed himself for the king and so Elesin’s suicide had no meaning. This was a part of the destruction of the culture. There are many reasons that

This is more significant because his actions destroyed this long line of the native culture. Not only did not kill himself on time, he cause a lot of chaos with in Nigeria because he would not sacrifice his life. This helped to break down how people feel about these ancient traditions and starts to make people veer away from their culture. The culture is hit by this more than just Elesin because by now Elesin is just gone and that is the whole story, but the culture doesn’t just die like a human does. The culture is still there when Elesin is gone, but Elesin’s late death helps to destroy the culture by discounting the meaning that it may have for some people. There is a most likely a huge number of native traditions that exist in Nigeria. These actions by Elesin could open a gateway to all of these important native traditions being thrown away and forgotten about. This could be a big force in the destruction of this culture and bring in a new era of more western thinking and worrying more about the lives of individuals and not as much worrying about something like a servant of the king escorting him into the afterlife. Iyaloja talks about