Adébísí Afọláyan: The Celebration of a Living Legend – His Life, Works and Everything In-Between

Description

Legend has it that there was a man with huge popularity and cult following in a distant village
community of old. He once thought to himself that he needed to ascertain the truth or falsity of
the genuineness of his followership. A Sage warned him not to believe what he was seeing until
he could see what he could not believe. And so, the sage then advised him to just make an
announcement about a terminal illness he had been diagnosed with, and that it would require a
small amount of money in order for him to get over the debilitating ailment. He went all over the
community, talking to his family members, friends, colleagues and all those admirers. He
appealed to them for support, but while everyone sympathized with him, not a single one was
willing to come to his aid by donating the money needed to get him cured. He was disappointed
but within him he still understood that people probably genuinely loved him, it was just that they
did not have the material things to support him at this time. He returned to the Sage, who
provided him another strategy to further measure the loyalty of those people that surrounded
him. He instructed him to arrange with his doctor and announce to the same group of people that
he had finally succumbed to the weight of the illness and eventually died, and that the funeral
had been arranged at a stipulated place and on a particular date.

On hearing this, the same group of people who had nothing to give to get this friend and relative cured came around to donate large sums of monies, and expensive materials – cattle, food, drinks, and other merchandise to celebrate his death. They purchased expensive clothing materials and called upon the best musicians far and wide to come and grace the occasion. They were dolling out bales of money to celebrate the dead man. It was during the people’s festive moods at the fake funeral that the man entered the room with his hands full of whisks and bludgeons to pummel the hypocrites out of his sight and out of his life.

This unique Festschrift honors the living legend Professor Adebisi Afolayan, unlike most that pay
tribute to the deceased. His “village community” genuinely reveres their popular man in both
words and actions. This three-part book opens with writings by intellectuals on his interests, then
showcases his prolific, versatile contributions spanning English language to musicology. This
reveals his relentless pursuit of impactful scholarship. Also, colleagues, family, friends and
students provide unfettered praise of this multifaceted nonagenarian – a religious family man,
comedian, musician, accessible intellectual juggernaut. Overall, the book captures how “the
rubber hits the road” in celebrating not the typical deceased honoree but a living versatile icon
who richly merits this rare tribute from his admiring community.

In all, this Festschrift is about a man of talent and ability about whom we can say, in the words of
William Shakespeare, “doth bestride the narrow world like a Colossus . . .,” and as one of his
extended children, Dr. Precious Afolayan, describes him, “an ordinary man with an extraordinary
personality. This Festschrift snugly fits the model of what Francis Bacon said:
“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested;
that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few
are to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.” This one is to be tasted, swallowed, chewed, digested . . . read curiously, wholly, and with diligence and attention.