The Lion and the Jewel takes place in Ilujinle, a small African village facing rapid

change. As the play begins, it is morning, and the audience sees a marketplace,
dominated by an immense odan tree. To the left of the stage is part of the village
school, within which the students chant the “Arithmetic Times.” Sidi enters the stage;
she is a beautiful, slim girl with plaited hair—the true village belle. Balancing a pail on
her head and wearing a broad cloth, Sidi attracts the attention of Lakunle, the young
schoolteacher, who looks out the school windows to admire her beauty.

Lakunle, dressed in an old-style, threadbare, unironed English suit, scolds Sidi for
carrying the pail on her head, telling her that the weight of the pail will hurt her spine
and shorten her neck. He wants her to be a “modern” woman. Sidi, however, quickly
reminds him of the times he has sworn that her looks do not affect his love for her.
There is a comic exchange of charge and countercharge between the two, revealing
Lakunle’s uncomfortable attitude about Sidi’s showing parts of her body: “How often
must I tell you, Sidi, that a grown-up girl must cover up her. . . . Her shoulders.”

This first scene also introduces Baroka, the Bale (the village chief): Sixty-two years
old, wiry, goateed, he is also attracted by Sidi. The Bale, the opposite of Lakunle, is
an artful, traditional man who resists the building of roads and railways, trying to
keep his society insulated from “progress.” The dialogue between these two men
constitutes the crux of the play: the conservative, clear view of life represented by
the Bale versus the progressive sloganeering of Lakunle. Beneath this sociopolitical
theme is the other struggle—the war for Sidi’s love.