Why I dropped out of school to focus on writing —Daniel Mbolo

IT was just six months before Daniel Mbolo would finish his first degree in Law at the Niger Delta University in Bayelsa when he felt his intellectual capacity was not being tasked enough, and thus, he bade farewell to the programme. That was in 2005.

Inasmuch as that decision sounded somehow to many people, Mbolo, who now writes under the pen name, Sheathsword Nazaritus, feels he is now fulfilling his true calling as a writer.

Mbolo, who is currently on a six-week residency at the Ebedi International Writers Residency in Iseyin, Oyo State, has patterned his writing after that of William Shakespeare, a style which embraces dramatic poetry in telling stories. His work, ‘The Divine Tragedies’, is a composition of 25 plays adapted from the Holy Bible.

The first volume of ‘The Divine Tragedies’, which is a 1,017-page book, was completed in 2018, while he started the second volume last January.

“My style is dramatic poetry, that is, poetry in drama; plays or dramas are meant to be performed on stage, but they are written down first. I am just focusing on writing the plays at the moment, as a lot of things come into play when embarking on stage performance.

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“The Divine Tragedies is a compilation of 25 plays, all derived from the intrigues and events in the old and the new testaments of the Bible. The plays are from the fall of the first man, Adam, to the death of Jesus Christ. There have always been adaptations of stories, and I have done the same thing for the Bible.”

On why he dropped out of school, Mbolo said, “I was about to graduate when I felt my intellectual capacity was not being tested enough.”

“I could remember that even in school, my mates came to me whenever they needed to learn anything. I was always taking them in extra-mural classes. In fact during examinations, I was always done before the normal three-hour time frame, so I felt I needed new challenges.

“When I said I was done just six months before graduation, people thought I was crazy, but to me, I felt I had wasted four and a half years of my life studying Law.

“What really pissed me off was that the university was a new one then, established by the late Dieprieye Alamieyeseigha, and because of the location, the lecturers were not coming to class. I was the one who was teaching some of my mates.

“The lecturers don’t come until it was two weeks to examination. I could remember that a new lecturer gave us an assignment and I was the one who taught my mates how to go about it, so when the scores came, out of 30, those I taught scored 15 and above, while I scored five.

“I later realised the lecturer felt I was acting beyond my capacity and wanted to fail me at all cost, so I knew I was done.”

However, despite not completing his degree, Mbolo has no regrets, “Why should I even have regrets because I still stand by what made me leave school at that time. I was not getting the right intellectual challenge and there was no reason pretending all was well.

“I wanted more challenge than just being a lawyer or a judge, so in 2009, I went back to Shakespeare’s works and read all. So that was how I patterned my writing after Shakespeare’s.

“I have also presented the first version of my book to Professor Wole Soyinka and he was marveled. We have a couple of things to do together as a result of that.”

On the level of support for literature in the country, Mbolo believes not many people understand the creative value of literature, “and when that happens, people won’t identify with it.

“It only sums up what the society truly believes in; today, the society believes in entertainment, and that is why many corporate organisations support entertainment programmes, so who can blame them for that? It is when these organisations realise the power of literature that they will begin to support it,” Mbolo said.

Nigerian Tribune