Lest we forget, the arts evoke our humanity

Lest we forget that East Africans fought and lost their lives in the First World War, Davina Leonard and John Sibi-Okumu staged a series of readings last Monday night, just a day after Northern Europeans commemorated the armistice that annually marks the end of that war’s most horrifying hostilities when Western powers fought among themselves and Africans served as their proxy fighters.

Armistice Day was celebrated this year on November 11 in Paris. But in Nairobi, it was at Alliance Francaise that Davina and John recited a series of poignant poems together with extracts from historic letters, notebooks and memories. All but a few had been written during or immediately after the so-called Great War which had supposedly been fought “to end all war”.

Alas, that was not the case as World War One merely opened the floodgates of further strife and bloodier conflicts erupting throughout the last century and even up to now. Lest we Forget was devised by Davina and shared between the two as they took turns painting an evocative portrait of the horrors of war and the tragedy of so many lives lost in the most excruciating conditions.

Writing to make sense out of the nonsensical had to be one reason so many gifted poets wrote during that time, between 1914 and 1918. But even today, Kenya has gifted writers like Walter Sitati whose play Sins and Secrets also sought to make sense out of the irrational gap between the super-rich and the poor in our society.

Peter (Elvis Gatere ) and Janel (Tracy Amadi) met while working in the same law office. But outside the office, they have little in common. She’s a child of privilege whose father’s wealth meant she’s never had to sweat for anything, unlike Peter who’s the son of a single mother and has had to struggle every step of the way.

Sins and Secrets isn’t a story of class struggle, but it effectively illustrates the irrefutable need for change in a world where injustice, greed and inequality seem to take precedence over humanity and honesty.