RATENG" AND BRIDE: CONFLICT, POWER AND CORRUPTION

In RATENG AND BRIDE, novelist and poet JR Alila revisits political commentary, humor and satire, and employs metaphors and imagery as he challenges the hero (Rateng') to abandon a lifelong ambition of reigning in a killer, illusive Bride. The poet warns that attempts to redeem our pride and personal honor in the persuit of power (the bride), often blind us and make us foreget our more important contributions to society. In RATENG' AND BRIDE, JR Alila revisits and mourns certain tragic political events in Kenya's short post-independence political history. Through the experiences of the hero RATENG' the author warns of the corrupting, material allure and deadly charms of unregulated power ( Rateng's illusive Bride—call her The Presidency). The poet tells us in song that power is dirty, is often over-glorified, and like a genie, its gains to the holder are brief and blissful. The poet reminds us that Power otherwise brings personal anguish and sacrifice to those (like Rateng') who seek it, and that power has the universal tendency to corrupt those with it and their cronies. Through Rateng', the author warns that, like a gem, unregulated Power (the Presidency) corrupts everybody it touches, and that its corrupting effects linger like the nauseating smell of a scared skunk. Casting his poetic net wide, Alila captures the essence Luo Oral tradition, as he pilots its literary vehicles in song (wer), self-praise (pakruok), satire (ageta), and proverbs (ngeche), and never shy to go Luo vernacular with proverbs specifically. In RATENG' AND BRIDE, poet Alila has managed to uplift the role of poetry and song in Kenya's post-independence political discourse, even as he must walk delicately with the reader into, and out of, a more recent, tragic and deadly political match between two powerful suitors (Rateng' and Milo) over one Bride (POWER), with one biased Referee in the ring, and their adversarial supporters fighting ringside.