AMNESTY

Amnesty was originally published by the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) in 1988 through Update Communications Ltd, Ilupeju, Lagos, Nigeria. That edition is now out of print. The current imprint retains all the poems in the original volume. There are only very slight authorial amendments to a few of the poems to remove certain typos that slipped in underhand, whilst continuing the hymnal value of the original poems.

The poems in the collection show the poet as a vatic chronicler, "pouring votive hymns unto earth". In the crypt of his soul, Ilori shuttles between personal memories, myths, social events and historical figures to create a subtle blend of invocatory poetry in the tradition of Wole Soyinka's darker Prison Poems. The title is suggestive and the amnesty that these poems ask for is for prisoners of all kinds - those behind physical bars and those caged in metaphysical anguish. In "Masks", the poet reproaches his body:

My flesh wants to secede
In the far depths of Night's anthill flesh...

Amnesty reaches out for this kind of freedom which unites man with his being, both in the private and communal senses.

Ilori was a pupil of Soyinka at the University of Ife in Nigeria (now Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife), where he graduated in Dramatic Arts in 1982 and obtained a master's degree in literature in 1985. He lectured at the University from 1983 to 1990, and his early poems were published in Sokoti, Ijala and ISALA at the University. Moreover, the University published his poems, Voices of the Hurricane, in its monograph series in 1983. Ilori has published several essays on Nigerian drama and theatre. His recent publications include Wole Soyinka and Other Poems (2014), The Theatre of Wole Soyinka (2017) and The Theatre of Ola Rotimi (2017). Ilori has a PhD in Housing (University of Bradford, 2012) and a second PhD in Performance and Cultural Industries (University of Leeds, 2016). Ilori is also an alumnus of Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, where he obtained a master's degree in Housing in 1998.