Discuss Gesinde's contribution to the development of the plot.
In Femi Osofisan's Women of Owu, Gesinde is the herald or messenger of the victorious allied forces, the counterpart of Talthybius in Euripides' The Trojan Women. Although he is an agent of the conquerors, Gesinde is one of the chief engines of the plot: it is largely through him that the fates of the captive women of Owu are announced, and each of his entrances launches a fresh episode of the tragedy.
He is the bearer of the conquerors' decisions. Gesinde arrives repeatedly among the women to announce how the allied leaders have disposed of them. Erelu herself calls him a messenger of doom, for whenever he appears the women expect the worst. He is the channel between the unseen victors and the suffering captives, so that each turn of the plot and each new sorrow is delivered through his mouth.
He announces the individual fates that structure the play. The action advances through a series of announcements about particular women, and Gesinde is the one who conveys them: that Erelu is to be handed over, and that her daughters and the other women are to be carried off as slaves and concubines. Each of these declarations triggers a fresh confrontation and lament, giving the episodic play its forward movement.
He delivers, and even executes, the cruellest decree. It is Gesinde who breaks the most terrible news of all, the order that the royal child must die so that no heir of Owu survives to seek revenge, and it is he who carries out the killing of Adumaadan's son, the baby Aderogun. Through this he drives the plot to its most harrowing point and exposes the ruthlessness of the victors.
He is a reluctant and sympathetic instrument. Osofisan gives Gesinde a conscience. Though he must obey his master, he is emotional and defensive, disowning responsibility for the atrocities he announces: “I am only a messenger, just a borrowed mouth.” He sheds tears at the sight of Adumaadan paying her last respects to her slain son, and, moved with pity, he volunteers to dig a grave and bury the baby Aderogun himself. This complexity deepens the drama, for the very bearer of doom is troubled by the cruelty, and the play's moral vision is broadened beyond a simple opposition of victor and victim.
He supplies information, continuity and even a touch of irony. As a messenger figure Gesinde keeps the audience informed of events happening off-stage among the conquerors, linking the world of the defeated women to the decisions of the triumphant army and bridging the play's separate episodes. He also has a gossiping, ironic streak: when Maye agrees to take back his unfaithful wife Iyunloye, Gesinde observes that “beauty has conquered again, as before,” and he callously announces Iyunloye's triumph to the women in the midst of their agony, sharpening the play's bitter contrast between her fortune and their ruin.
Conclusion. Gesinde contributes to the development of the plot as the loyal herald who announces the fates of the women, triggers each successive episode, delivers and even carries out the play's most terrible decree, and, through his reluctant sympathy and ironic commentary, enriches its moral texture. Without him the news that drives the tragedy could not reach the stage, and the plot of Women of Owu would lose the very voice that sets its sorrows in motion.
