Unmasking the metaphor: symbolic structures and the architecture of meaning in Femi Osofisan’s theatre

This paper investigates the centrality of symbols and symbolisms as epistemic gateways to meaning in Femi Osofisan’s dramaturgy, with a focus on Many Colours Make the Thunder King, Farewell to a Cannibal Rage, and Once Upon Four Robbers. Osofisan’s plays abound in symbolic representations—material, mythic, ecological, political, and performative—through which he interrogates postcolonial tensions, socio-political contradictions, class conflict, moral decay, and the complexity of human nature in modern African societies. To decode these multilayered signifying systems, the study adopts a composite theoretical framework comprising Semiotic Theory, Postcolonial Theory, Marxist Criticism, and Myth and Ritual Theory. These frameworks collectively illuminate the ideological, cultural, and aesthetic functions of symbols in Osofisan’s dramaturgy. Using qualitative textual analysis, the study uncovers how Osofisan deploys ecological motifs, masquerade aesthetics, performative gestures, costumes, mythic reinventions, and allegorical characters to communicate messages on leadership failure, social justice, communal solidarity, and the need for moral renewal. The paper argues that Osofisan’s symbolic imagination is not merely ornamental but constitutive of his vision of theatre as a tool for social awareness, ethical awakening, and political transformation.