Background of John Ruganda

John Ruganda was born in 1942 in Toro District western Uganda. He attended secondary
schools up to O level as St. Leos Fort portal and studied for his A level at Ntare School in
Mbarara. In 1964, he entered Makerere University College to study for a Bachelor of Arts
degree ultimately specializing in English. His interest in drama became firmly established as
an undergraduate when he emerged as a talented actor, a poet, playwright and director.

John Ruganda was one of the earliest members of Makerere students’ free traveling theatre
which annual set out on a tour of E. Africa to take drama to the people.
His own play featured prominently in the university’s annual inter-hall drama contest,
notably: Black Mamba, and covenant with death.

On graduating from Makerere with a hons Degree in English, Ruganda took up the post of
Editor and sales representative in Oxford university press. He continued to take a keen
interest in drama and was closely associated with one of amateur. Theatre group in Kampala
and particularly at Makerere University.

In 1971, he founded the Makerere group and amateur theater company which subsequently
gave highly successful production of plays like “Edufa”, “Dark side of the moon” and later on
the “The Burdens”.

In 1973, he was appointed senior creative fellow attached to the literature department of
Makerere University. This was largely in recognition of his commendable contribution to the
theater in Uganda and E. Africa as a whole. His other writings then consisted of poetry, short
stories and articles which had been variously published in makerere of which he had been
chief editor, pen point magazine and other literal magazines. Some of his poems later
appeared in poems for E. Africa.
PLOT SUMMARY:
Act One (Pg 1-44)
The play is set in a humble home of the family living in a semi-permanent house smeared with
cow dung, and full of cobwebs despite the few luxury items in the house.

It opens with Tinka sitting alone in their living room seemingly weaving a mat. She wears an
‘I have been through hell kind of face’ and as we the readers know, she is also setting a trap
for Wamala, an erstwhile (former) Cabinet Minister. Kaija, her fourteen year old son enters
from the children’s bedroom. He has come to complain that his nine year old sister, Nyakake,
has once again wet the bed which they share. As a matter of fact, he has come to ask for more
food and to put forth his scheme to sell groundnuts in order to earn enough to buy his own
bed. Their discussion is interrupted by dogs sniffing outside the house; a sound which they
fear may mean ‘Kondos’ (thieves). Soon the conversation turns to real fears and anxieties.
Kaija fears that Nyakake might have TB to which his mother commends that were not Wamala
such a heavy drinker, they could take the girl to a proper doctor. This leads to an attack by
Tinka on Wamala’s incompetence. She cunningly advises Kaija, “Next time, ask him
innocently of course, Father! Do old mothers buy beds for their sons, pay school fees for their
children and... Poll-tax for their husbands?”

In defense of his father, Kaija puts forth Wamala’s argument that Tinka is “a big millstone
round his neck… a big burden; who brought them down to poverty” but Tinka claims that they
never were really well off. Kaija does feel that she is a bit tough on her husband. Tinka is
forced to try to win back his sympathy which she does by saying “Next time He’ll say you are
a burden, dragging him down with your school fees and beds.

Rather than lend her son two shillings for his groundnut scheme, Tinka offers to make and
sell mats to provide him with shorts and a bed. In return, Kaija is to say nothing to his father.
For the second time; Tinka mentions that Kaija seems unhappy. He replies that she has
become bad-tempered and that his happiness seems to irritate his father.

Again the conversation is interrupted by some sounds outside. This time a bumping on the
roof which makes them suspects that their bananas are being stolen. After the interruption,
Tinka recalls her past happiness when her mother used to tell her stories in the evening, a
recollection which will be used by Kaija as he begs her for a story. She blames her poverty, but
Kaija says that “anger and bitterness are the cause of her unhappiness”.
Now Tinka turns on her son, jealous of his friends, especially his girlfriends. Kaija is ashamed
into admitting his gratitude-‘we have been a burden to you’- but he gets the reply No. I live
my life for you my children, he is the burden.

Tinka wants Kaija to go back to bed, but he insists on hearing a song or story. The Tale of
Ngoma’s beautiful gourd is as he says ‘your life, mother, and ours’ but she protests that she is
absolutely fed up with it. She finally relents, but introduces two new elements into the familiar
story, a palace which is blown down and a song, “Guns to play the drums”. The story tells how
a common leper won the beautiful Nyenje the only daughter of paramount chief Ngoma, by
climbing a tall tree bringing down the guard containing her umbilical cord.

This time they are interrupted by Wamala’s voice outside and Tinka hastily concludes; ‘to cut
the story short, the leper brought down the guard …that’s how a common leper, stinking with
leprosy and commonness…’

Kaija hears his father mentions abed, and become very excited but Tinka sends him off to bed.
Wamala enters and he has indeed brought a second-hand safari-bed but still in a reasonable
condition and he is quite pleased with himself whereas Tinka is indifferent to his excitement,
because her trap has been side-stepped. She merely coughs: “we are fed up with second hand
things”. Wamala however, tries to sweet-talk Tinka and tells her; ‘the bed’s still in a
reasonable condition. Strong and comfortable…it’ll excite the boy out of his senses’ Pg 18.

Wamala then insists on calling Kaija who has in any case been following the arguments
from behind his bed-room door. Very happy, he thanks Wamala; “good old father, good old…”
‘Father, you are just wonderful’ Pg. 19. He is again pushed back to bed by his mother. The son
is out of the way and the father takes the centre of the stage.
Tinka weave way, fuming, while Wamala smokes a cheap cigarette and seeks her support for
his latest money making scheme. She is merely interested in finding where he spent the
previous night. He however demonstrates the wastefulness of having only one head per match
stick. If only associated matched would put chemical heads on both ends of their matches,
thousands of pounds would be saved.
Wamala admits that he already has tried to see the managing director of associated matches,
only to be thrown out of the office by his foreign secretary who pulled out of the drawer
‘HAKUNA KAZI’ poster and sweetly said the managing director was busy
(Pg, 24). Wamala, full of himself, walks about as if in a trance. He then points a vivid picture
of their daily life and declares that he cannot stand it any more (Cfr pg. 25).

It turns out that he is sure that he has a better idea, which will really work. Indeed, the
International Slogan Syndicate has already earned him fifty shillings: ten for his thirst, ten
for the bed and fifteen each for both of them. His slogan will exploit white fear and black
pride-or at least appeal to sex as in the examples he gives (pg, 28).

The fifty shillings however was earned by a political slogan created for Vincent, a former ‘Saza
chief’, ‘fellow drinker and a thigh-monger’ who wants to stand in the next parliamentary
election. Tomorrow, Wamala will see him about the whole Syndicate business.

Tinka remains unimpressed. She not only refuses to give him some of the enguli which he
asked again and again, but dismisses his scheme as madness. When he accuses her of being
subversive (rebellious) and a big burden, she admits “so I am” (pg, 31). He finally threatens
to call the police, picks a fight and takes the drink by force. Tinka ends up with a bleeding
elbow which he washes and puts the cobweb on, in the mean time explaining why a man needs
a refuge at home! So when a man comes home, this hell, this crowd of power hungry bastards
with twitching (trembling) hands-hands eager to grab and get rich, get rich quickly-a man
wants sympathy and tenderness, tender care and kindness. ‘Not silent curses’ (pg, 35-36).

Kaija comes in on them and begs his father not to beat Tinka again. ‘You don’t know how
much it hurts’. Accused of turning children against their father, Tinka blames her actions on
her suffering. She remembers a little of their past riches, Wamala has drinks and women to
turn to. But Tinka has nothing. Wamala blames the current political situation and turns
abruptly to ‘the happier times’ of their courtship and early marriage.

From here we soon learn that Wamala has taken Tinka from the convent at the age of 29 after
thirteen years of life there. She is still shocked that they actually had sex by the chapel and in
the cemetery, and Wamala admits that in marrying her, he was hitting back at the church
which had called him ‘communist’ at the colonial establishment, for she was the only daughter
of a progressive Christian chief. They go on to speak of the independence celebrations and of
the corruption and hypocrisy which followed.

When thinking a bout their former life, Tinka touches on a sensitive subject, the insidious up
surge of relatives and friends who had disappeared at Wamala’s detention. With this, they are
back with their major argument about the cause of Wamala’s downfall. He blames it on
Yankees, she on his ambition when he suggests approaching the old Veteran to ask for
forgiveness and new economic state in life, she notes cynically that he wouldn’t get past the
guards and that should he phone or write, the Yankee secretary would stop him.

After complaining bitterly about the foreign domination with black connivance
(responsibility), they go to bed hand-in-hand to enjoy the only thing that works these days!
(Cfr pg, 44).

Act Two (Pg 45-65)

This act opens the following day, late afternoon with the same setting. The safari bed is still
in the room and in another corner, you can see some items. Tinka is getting ready to distil
enguli. Wamala enters with the clothes he has borrowed from the teacher for his call on
Vincent (Cfr pg, 46). Looking at Tinka’s distilling apparatus; he expresses his fear of the
police. Tinka however replies that they will leave her alone if they get their share
“A quarter bottle and they are back to the station” (Cfr pg, 45). Obviously, she knows her way
around in the slum world she professes to despise.

Wamala proceeds to dress in his borrowed clothing and under goes as Tinka says a complete
metamorphosis. In fact, he is so carried away by the memories of his old days as Cabinet
Minister that he imagines himself at a rally, talking to members of the civil service, speaking
of corrupt business deals, enjoying the girls, and even making a speech which he wants to be
published verbatim (the way it is).

Tinka is herself temporally carried away and able to get him out of his imagination only by
physically pulling him down from the chair which was his podium (platform) and reminding
him with his appointment with Vincent. But Wamala, as he admits, is afraid of being
humiliated, so Tinka advices him on the right way to approach Vincent. In fact she takes the
part of Vincent and as their conversation continues, becomes a perfect parody of Vincent:
‘callous and pompous’. After initially ignoring Wamala being absorbed in building plans, she
offers him a 555 and then drink, acting patronizing and sarcastic in turn.

Wamala goes on about slum living conditions, from which Vincent is shrouded by the hedge
and the barbed wire fence, only to be brought up short by Vincent’s impatience. Though
Vincent responds favorably to the political slogan, Wamala changes the subject to safety
matches. He then gives qualifications for employment in a moment of mutual confusion as to
the subject of his visit. When he finally blurts his plan for two top matches, he finds ‘Vincent’
ready with a number of objections-social, economic and technical.

Once Wamala discovers that Vincent is a director of associated Matches, their debate
degenerates into a slanting match in which Wamala predicts that he and the other pauper will
get their revenge on people like Vincent whom he calls a blood sucker, an exploiter, an arch
swindler. Tinka as Vincent cynically analyses the dispensable and uncommitted nature of ‘the
mass’ or the ‘middlemen’, and end by pulling out an imaginary pistol with which she threatens
to shoot the ‘shabby poet’ unless he leaves immediately. In a blind rage, Wamala smashes the
distilling apparatus as he taunts her to shoot and then grips her neck to strangle her, almost
choking her to death (Pg, 61).

Their physical struggle is interrupted by the sounds of ‘many boots of men on patrol’ which
recalls Wamala’s downfall some two years earlier when the soldiers came to arrest him. This
time ‘Vincent’ says the soldiers are out to get Wamala for his threat that the poor will turn
against the rich and the ‘shriveled fingers will throttle fat throats’ (Pg, 63).
Tinka continues to bait him claiming that the room is bugged and that Wamala’s comments
have been over heard when he sees that there is not way out, Wamala grabs ‘Vincent’ and
using ‘him’ as a shield, is about to face the imaginary guns outside.

As Kaija enters, the boots from without recede. Taking him for a soldier, Wamala attacks his
own son but Tinka shows him that it is only Kaija. Wamala jerks to a stop, recognizing Kaija.
He is so ashamed of himself that he simply sits down head between his knees, dumbfounded.
Tinka bursts out into prolonged laughter. The situation relaxes.
Act Three (Pg 66-81)
A day has passed, and early in the morning, Tinka is ‘packing in a hurried, haphazard manner’
as Kaija enters from his bed room and asks about his father’s where about. Told causally that
Wamala is gone, Kaija refuses to believe his mother, and reveals his fear that the police have
taken his father away. Kaija thinks he is to blame, first of all for selling the regalia, which
evidently led to his parents fight, and secondly for anger, up-rooting Kaboga’s cotton and then
beating Tibasagga, when she up braised him for destroying the crop.

Upset and embarrassed by the open fight between his parents, he had fled the scene in anger
and misery. His father caught up with him at the republic swimming pool, where Kaija was
imagining his parents fighting ‘tearing at each other like mad… in that pool’ (Pg, 72). Wamala
sends the boy home after a final defense of his drinking.

Tinka then reveals that after Kaija had gone to sleep, Wamala had come home “wet as sponge
and carrying the odor of illicit intimacy”, and that a second fight ensued their time over sexual
satisfaction. After taking what she thought at the time, was a deserved beating, Tinka says ‘I
realized I had been right, so I stormed in… and it happened’ (Pg, 73). She will not, however,
reveal anymore, and the rest of the tale is told by Kaija in a form of a dream which he bears a
grouser followed by hurried footsteps and then sees a familiar skirt. In the dream, Tibasagga
stabs him in the breast.
At that point, Tinka interrupts Kaija’s tale with cream. Though Kaija reveals that his mother
shook him awake, she now suspects that he saw everything.

Finally, Nyakake is carried in by her mother, and she too, starts asking for her father. The
children describe their mother mercilessly, noting how she has grown old over night, how her
arm is scratched, how the veins show on her legs. This is too much for Tinka, and under the
strain, she tells them that they are about to go on a journey. This does not keep them from
thinking about Wamala, and finally, they refuse to leave: Nyakake primarily because of her
father, and Kaija because of his up coming examinations. Now Tinka breaks down and begins
sobbing softly as she apologizes in tears to them.

As the police knock at the door, we hear the closing words of the play “And always remember
it was not my fault” (Pg, 81). Just because the curtain falls, she starts wailing intensely. They
crouch in one heap as the truth dawns on the children.
CHARACTERS AND CHARACTERIZATIONS

1) WAMALA:

Wamala is a leading character in the play. Although Tinka is the one who is present on the
stage from the beginning to the end of the play, Wamala still dominates the play and makes a
greater impact on the audience that Tinka does. The play Wright makes Wamala a likable
character with an endearing sense of humor which enables him to get over the frustrations of
his life and go on living under circumstances which other men might have found too much to
bear.

Wamala’s biggest obstacle is his wife who instead of giving him encouragement during the
lean days has turned her back on him. But, although she levels him an irresponsible drunkard,
who neither cares nor can look after his family, from the moment when Wamala steps on the
stage, he shows through every crisis but it’s he who up holds what remains of his family life.
There is never any doubt left in the minds of the audience, as to who is the real burden. Note
that we never see Wamala as a drunkard, on the contrary, he appears on full control of himself
and he is coherent, witty and intelligent in what he does and say.

He is depicted as generous and always giving something or giving ways to his wise
dominations. All these contradict Tinka’s opinions of him expressed in the earlier part of the
play when she literally implies that Wamala has never been a real man. “He has never been
up Kaija; I want you to know that. Never really been up. As high as men like Isaza, Isimbwa.
A lamb is not a lion son (Pg, 6).

In defense of his father, Kaija point out that every one calls Wamala chief-‘they respect him
and seek his advice’ but she thinks its all flattery for he has never really been up. Kaija’s reply
is as sarcastic as she her self is capable of. “He doesn’t have to have been up to be my father”,
I supposed. So although Wamala may be a drunkard and although his wife may have no
respect left for him there are people in their community who still respect him as his own son
does.

Already, there is contradiction about Wamala which make him a human character with two
sides to him: the good and the bad. This we know because he even makes an appearance on
the stage.

When Wamala finally appears on the stage, he very quickly establishes himself as a man with
a sense of humor. His laughter invades the stage we even see him and when he finally enters,
dragging a camp bed, the tension experienced earlier on in the mother-son episode at once
comes into an atmosphere of humor in spite of Tinka’s obvious rebuff and the cold shoulder
she turns on him. Already the fact that he has been out too late and the accusation that he
doesn’t care about his family has been dispelled by the fact that he has not only declined an
invitation to watch a wrestling match but he has also brought home a bed for Kaija.

Although Tinka ignores him and the bed, he is obviously a man who is not easily daunted
(discouraged); he goes on praising it and when she stubbornly refuses to soften up, he insists
on calling in Kaija to appreciated it himself. His whole language with respect to the bed has
sexual connotations, revealing what sort of man he is, a man who evidently spends a great
deal of time in the company of other men, cracking jokes. Throughout this scene, he keeps on
urging Tinka to let Kaija come out and see or fell the softness of his new pride contrary to
what Tinka had led us to expect. Wamala In this sense is the very epitome of the loving father
who likes to provide for his children when he can and share their happiness with them.

Let alone with his wife, it’s Wamala who evidently makes every effort to smoothen out their
relationship. While she is bristling for quarrel, Wamala does everything to avoid one, talking
instead about his ideas. Wamala the thinker is obviously an intelligent man; a man we can
believe has been forced down below his station in life.

His ideas about safety matches are remarkably intelligent and inventive: one wishes he had
the capacity to it to fruition because of his persuasiveness, he even manages lift Tinka out of
her pensive mood into excitement about an idea given the chance, one feels that he might
have sold the idea to associated matches if the security guards and the secretary had not come
between him and the management.
As it is, he can not even get a job because the prospective employers are always asking for
three referees whereas the only people who know him and who are associated with him are
his fellow drunks and thigh mongers-“Drunks at the republic bar who best know the
predicaments of the developing nation (Pg, 25).

The later comment by Wamala may be the light vain, but what follows, it reveals a sensitive
man who has been driven into this kind of life by circumstances he is helpless against; the
vicious cycle representing the hard world which has squeezed him out on the one hand and
the in which the best he can get is a cold reception on the other. Rejected both ways, Wamala
has no option left but drink (which he admits) and other women (naturally he does admits
this, although he is unable to convincingly disclaim association with them). when Tinka tries
to force him to admit later, he is driven to the final reveal, the ideas he has come up with,
which has earned him some money already: he more or less buys his ways out of the fix by
sharing the balance with her. The of the slogan syndicate itself like that of the safety matches
confirms his intelligence, though Tinka tries to play it down to the extent that he forced to
voice criticism against her character. “You are a very sensitive woman,” “Tinka you are a very
big burden” (pg 31).

This is an answer to of her dismissing of his slogan syndicate as an erosion of advertising

standards and betrayal of originality; a timely subversive judgment, coming from a wife who
would be expected to encourage her man.

Their squabbling over the bottle of enguli which unexpectedly develop into a mild violent
struggle does not really pain Wamala as a brute; rather it is his dubious ingenuity that comes
through. He initially takes it all for a joke until Tinka shows that she does mean to take the
bottle from him. It cannot be denied that he uses his superior strength to get what he wants;
men often do that kind of thing and she does not take it too much to act, for although he
threatens that one day he will pay for it clearly, we cannot take it for granted that it is then
what she begins to plan to murder him.

The important thing to note is that he is able to show her enough tenderness and attention
(which she had been caring for) with the result that they go onto talk about their courtship
On very friendly terms, revealing all the irrelevant details of their intimacy of the happy days
they have known. At the end of the first act when they go off to bed hand in hand to alone
scene in the privacy of their bedroom, the credit is largely his for he has clearly done
everything to bring about an understanding between them.

Wamala, the ambitious politician, is not in evidence and all we see is a man hungering for his
wife’s affection as a buffer against a world which has denied him a place.

It’s important to note that Wamala like playing roles: especially any role that gives him a
chance to relieve the posts he has left. For example, he enjoys playing the role of a politician
meeting VIPs at a rally (pg 46-47) and it takes an effort for Tinka to drive him back to reality.
This tendency to take refuge in an illusion is quite understandable. It’s a psychological
mechanism which we all have, and which we resort to when we want to shield ourselves from
accepting unpleasant facts which are nevertheless the realities we have to live with everyday.

Most people like to pretend they are this or that and for a moment get carried away by the
belief that they are really what they pretend to be. In the episode mentioned above Wamala
really believes that he is once again the popular politician who is the heart and soul of the
party sought by everyone and dispensing favors left, right and centre. Left unchecked, it can
be dangerous tendency as indeed becomes evident later in the play, when Tinka takes on the
role of Kanagonago and gets into a row with Wamala which culminates in his believing that
he is indeed a man who is being hunted down by the soldiers: a cornered man who must fight
and take at least on of them down with him.

Narrowly missing his own son whom he doesn’t recognized at that moment, we are first told
of this characteristic of Wamala by Tinka who says he is a man who likes to glimpse into the
past so as to make the present toleaerable and the future worth waiting for. This in it self is
neither negative nor dangerous; it is only when carried to extremes that it becomes a
dangerous thing.

In Vincent Kanagonago scene, a great deal more comes to light about Wamala’s character is
portrayed to be that of a man who can get completely engrossed in his imaginations and he is
capable of committing a crime (like murdering his wife) without really knowing what he is
really doing. She spurs him into this, knowing very well what sort of man he is because she
knows she can control him in the end. In view of this, it is surprising that at the end of the
play, it is she rather him who resort to murder, her argument being that he has driven her to
it (Murder); that he has been a burden. But his own argument that she has along been a
burden, constantly dragging him down, still stands too.

The audience is left with an open question: which of the two is the burden? Either of both?
Most people like the play Wright himself, would be strongly inclined to Wamala.

Points in Summary
Humorous, Generous, Dejected, Drunkard, Fails to uphold a family, undermined by his wife,
poor, loving, sensitive, helpless, a burden, brutal, un justly killed, likes glimpsing into the
past, Politician, Ex-minister, Creative, Ambitious, irresponsible, self pity, Economical, etc

2) TINKA

Tinka’s main flaw of x-ter seems to be that she never accepts that she is in the wrong.

The play opens with her sitting ‘like a patient awaiting attention’ feeling sorry for herself and
blaming all her miseries on the husband who has taken to the bottle and other women and
left her to find for her self and their children.

Although she doesn’t admit that she has poisoned the children’s minds against their father, it
is true in every thing she says and does as is evident at the opening of Act One. She wears
mood that merely makes the audience to believe that she is a neglected wife and yet, we the
readers know that she simply wants to exploit the sympathy of the reader and of her two
children to use it fight the husband. Quite evident about this, she sarcastically refers to
Wamala as “our loving father” and when she says ‘a boy with a father should have a bed of his
own’. Let alone when she says that Wamala has never really been up.
Clearly, Tinka throughout put the play invites us to feel sorry for her and go along with her in
putting the blames on her husband. When he tries to explain to her what is wrong with him,
how he is frustrated by her coldness toward him and appeals for just a little love to enable
him to get on and face the world, she never really responds. The conclusion we draw from her
silence is that he must be right in complaining that she is always undermining him. Although
he is generous enough not to actually say to her face that she is self-centred and thinks she is
the only one who is right, that seems to be true of her.

Tinka comes out best as a x-er when she is forced to forget her own misery and get involved
with some one else. This is what happens when Kaija makes her relate the story of the leper
and Ngoma’s beautiful daughter (Pg, 15-17). It takes an effort for Kaija to get her cooperate
and he has to prompt her all that way though. She becomes more and more involved as the
story develops; the same thing happens over and over again between her and Wamala who is
also able to get her cooperate, like in the episode of the safety matches and the one about their
courtship and their earlier happy marriage life together, the only time when she is the one
doing the prompting in the Kanagonago episode in which she urges Wamala to participate in
this episode. She seems to enjoy the chance she gets bully Wamala and put him in his right
place-evidently, a subversive role, quite different from when Wamala introduces her into
play-acting which is usually designed to get her out of her gloom.

If we accept that Tinka has had short comings as wife, we also consider the effect this has had
on her role as a mother. Wamala accuses her of poisoning the minds of children against him
and we can see how her relationship with Kaija is stained that she must bear part of the blame
for the way in which he is growing to be over sensitive. Apart from the very biased view she
keeps him off his father through out the play, Tinka is also forced to lie to the children in the
last ct of the play when Wamala was murdered. Murder-like suicide is an extreme action and
it takes someone quite emotionally unbalanced to resort to such measures.

We have seen how emotionally unbalanced Wamala himself seems to be: a man who feels
persecuted by the world and by his own family so that he is only saving grace in his sense of
humor and whatever consolation he can get from the bottle and from his alleged affairs with
other women.

Tinka too, is emotionally unbalanced: she feels that life has been unfair to her and that her
husband has neglected her and taken off to drinking and other women but whereas he would
like to make amends by continuing to seek her affection-the withdrawal of which is the cause
of all the problems according to him. She is not prepared even to acknowledge her own short
comings. With such an attitude, it’s not all together surprising that in the end, she takes the
opportunity to have her revenge; not during another of their quarrels and fights but rather
when he is asleep, she makes a reality one of the stories her mother used to tell her of drunken
men stabbed to death by their jealous wife in the dead of the night (Pg, 11-12).

Wamala is killed by his jealous wife because he has come home wet “as a sponge and carrying
odor of illicit intimacy” that Tinka is a jealous person- and quite unreasonable so-also comes
out when Kaija implies that he has friends even girls, to which she jealously, “like father, like
son” (Pg, 12). She then goes on to advice him to be aware of women for they will take him
away from his mother hardly the kind of advice a normal mother expects her son to marry
one day would give her son.

So when we examine the two x-ters, we are not absolutely certain which of them is less
balanced though the scale finally weighs in favour of Wamala-the victim rather than Tinka
who commits the crime of murder.

Points in Summary
Never accepts she is in the wrong, Miserable, Poisons children’s minds, Undermines respect
and love, Subversive, Jealous, Neglected wife, ill-planned, Quarrelsome, murderer, Proud,
Distrustful, etc

3) KAIJA

Kaija is presented through out the play as a sensitive boy who is gravely affected by his
parents’ marital chaos. He is torn between his affection, for his mother has no respect right
from the beginning he is defending one or the other, depending on which one is doing the
attacking. When Tinka makes scathing remarks about Wamala, it’s Kaija who tells her that
his father too complains of her being a burden, constantly dragging him down.

Although he tries to be impartial, this gets him nowhere; his mother just will not listen to
reason or accept criticism of her self. When she says his father has never really been up, it’s
Kaija who tries to redress the balance by pointing out that some people respect his father and
seek his advice. For all the pain he takes to redress the balance in the precarious relationship
between his father and mother, Kaija is never taken as an understanding boy who ahs been
forced to mature before his time.

The play Wright himself makes the mistake of depicting him fluttering a round like a child
“good old father, good old father…” (pg, 19) is an example of what comes up quite often. Tinka,
who is happy enough to have been around and make him listen to her woes, hustles him to
bed as soon as hears her husband’s voice.

When the bed is brought in by Wamala, although he shows a liking for his son, and would like
him to come out and enjoying the pleasure of finally getting a bed of his own, he scams to his
wife’s insistence that Kaija (who is thus made to look like a baby) must go back to bed. They
don’t even realize that he can not sleep while they are making all the rackets; they fail to see
that he is not a child any more but a young man, and unusually perceptive adolescent.

Kaija’s sensitivity far from making his father see him a grown up, makes Wamala irritable as
in the scene when he pushes Tinka and she hurts her elbow. Kaija comes out and tells his
father not to do it again for it hurts him to see them act that way. Wamala’s patience wears
thin and this time it is he and not Tinka who roughly orders Kaija to go back to bed. Because
of always coming in between the cross-firing when his father and mother quarrel, Kaija nearly
comes to a nasty end at the culmination of Kanagonago scene when Wamala mistakes him for
one of the soldiers coming to arrest him and almost kill him in his determination to go down
with at least one of them.

Kaija’s super sensitivity comes out in the third act of the play when he relates his destructive
conducts from the time of his parents fight and the dreams he has witnessed his father’s
murder. His mother realizes gradually that she can not really help to deceive him when he
keeps on asking for his father. Unlike Nyakake whom she can order to keep quiet, Kaija rouses
all her feelings of guilt and makes her betray herself in all her actions so that she resorts to an
explanation which is only a fixed formula: that their father has gone far away for burial. That
they take so long before they come to realize what their mother has done is not really because
Kaija too is too young to know but because he is preoccupied in his own sense of guilt for
uprooting Kaboga’s cotton and breaking Tibasaga’s pot after thrusting her.
Kaija’s role in the play is clearly that of heightening the tension between Tinka and Wamala
rather that reducing it-or it’s the fact abit of both? Again, it’s an open question left for the
audience to answer that is it certainly true that Kaija does play the role of probing into the
uneasy conscience of both parents?

Points in Summary
-Neglected child, super-sensitive, inquisitive, defending x-ter, forced to mature before time,
perceptive adolescent, heightening tension between his Parents, produce easy conscience,
very innovative, remorseful, etc.

4) NYAKAKE

Nyakake is not only neglected but almost forgotten until the end of the play.
Apart from her coughing and occasional reference made to her when it is convenient in the
play, even the play Wright seems to forget all about her. This is because she is not really
necessary in the development of the plot: there is nothing she could have done which Kaija
doesn’t fulfill in the play. Kaija plays the role of neglected child, wearing tattered clothes, and
if the play Wright had wanted he would have given Kaija the cough too on top of the unpaid
fees.

So Nyakake has really got no role in the first part of the play where her cough is only theatrical
ornamentation. She only makes an appearance at the end of the play when she is again
supper-audible used to add to Kaija’s voice in driving Tinka with crazy-guilt. The two voices
of innocent relentlessly perusing the mother leave her in a state of helplessness and build up
the climax in which they all finally crouched in one heap like a lamp of jelly. Even then, one
can not help asking: is there any need in the play for Nyakake?

The play Wright doesn’t make much effort to differentiate between Kaija and Nyakake in the
dialogue except that she says Mama and Papa, which suggests her being younger that Kaija.
Is that all to consider about her?
She is not allowed trying to develop into a real x-ter and the audience too would be inclined
to dismiss her ornamentation.

Points in Summary
Neglected, helpless, hopeless, a great pisser, sickly

THEMES IN THE BURDENS

There are a number of themes in the burdens which immediately suggest themselves:-

1) The problem of Marriage;

The problem of marriage is evident: there are quarrels that make it impossible for a husband
and wife to bear each other and live in harmony. Through out the play, we see examples of
disagreements, arguments and even violence between the couple which eventually leads to
Wamala’s death.

2) Alcoholism;
While the problem of Marriage runs agreeable in the entire play, it is intensified by the
predicament of alcoholism. At the beginning of the play, Wamala is off-stage and obviously,
enjoying himself in the celebrated Republic Bar probably with friends although Tinka leads
us into believing that Wamala is always away because of his other wife (prostitution) as she
says; ‘I’m going to kill that bitch of yours, I warn you’ (Pg, 26).

Even the fight between Wamala and Tinka towards the end of Act One is brought about by his
lust for enguli that made him use force and storms into their bed room to look for the drink.
The resultant effect here is that Tinka is hurt (Pg, 33). This often contributes to the break-up
of the marriage.

3) Poverty;
The theme of poverty is present though out the play as Wamala and his family face the reality
of having no money, no jobs, and sometimes no idea as to where their next meal will come
from.

Poverty is a very real thing through out the play and lies behind the frustration that enhances
the family’s disintegration. We see poverty on the stage even before the play has really
started.

While others are living in opulence (state of wealth), e.g. Vincent Kanagonago, Wamala’s
family can hardly afford to make ends meet.

This is clearly brought out through stage settings and property such as; the semi-permanent
house made of mud and wattle, the walls smeared with cow dung, simple furniture, distilling
apparatus, Wamala borrowing clothes from the teacher for his call on Vincent and his
desperate idea for making money as he puts it himself “Poverty is the best incentive to
creativity” pg, 23 (his ideas of safety matches and the I.S.S, Pg 27 ), using cobweb to cover
Tinka’s bleeding elbow, Nyakake’s constant cough and she can’t be taken to a proper doctor,
Kaija’s scheme of selling Groundnuts in school to buy his bed and his tattered clothes, Tinka’s
mat and enguli, the daily menu of cold potatoes and beans, tea without sugar, etc. all these
are signs of poverty that John Ruganda puts forth in the play ‘The Burdens’.

4) Ambition and success

Wamala knows that his only chance of making a come-back both as a politician and a wealthy
man lies in his attaining some form of financial credibility and so he tries hard to hatch the
chick that it lays the golden egg as it were. He calls his ideas of the safety matches “the new
baby” and goes on to explain it with humour.
Wamala realizes that it takes capital to make a successful entrepreneur and that is what he
lacks most, or else he would not be in the halt in which he finds himself trapped by poverty.
He also has the sense to realize that he cannot really make it by simply selling off his ideas as
on the occasion when he meets old Vincent at the Republic Bar and sells him the slogan. He
knows that no one would buy an idea which is not backed with statistical data or capital.

When Tinka prevails upon him to take his slogan idea to old Vincent, the whole affairs ends
as a dress rehearsal in which Tinka in the role of old Vincent Kanagonago pours all her venom
(poison) on pity common man, while Wamala himself gets the opportunity to show how he
would throttle the fat neck of the rich who would ‘bleed a leech to further heifer’

5) Struggle to survive
This is also one of the dominant themes in the burdens. It becomes apparent in the play when
Tinka and Wamala fail to attain financial stability forcing them to dig left and right to find a
way of survival.

Their failure to attain financial stability consequently leads to their failure to attain marital
stability. In fact, the two make a kind of vicious cycle aggravating (annoying) one another and
making it impossible to ever get over it and survive.

Kaija, like his parents, is himself caught up in the same struggle for survival. At the beginning
of the play, he comes up with idea of selling roasted groundnuts at school to make the money
with which to buy a bed for himself. At the end of the play, its partly because he has taken it
upon himself to sell his father’s regalia to get money for his school fees and the doctor’s bill
for Nyakake that his parents come to final blows leading to Wamala’s death by the hand of his
wife.

We are left with no doubt at the end of the play that the struggle for economic survival to has
led to death like that of marital and political survival.
MINOR THEMES (To be discussed together in class with the teacher)

- Gender roles (Parents fail to play their gender roles effectively).

- Deception (seen in Wamala and Tinka at the end of the play, Pg 76).
- Disillusionment (Wamala, Tinka, Kaija are all disillusioned/disappointed).
- Betrayal (Most of the x-ters feel betrayed).
- Corruption (Tinka plans to bribe the police with a quarter bottle of enguli, Pg, 45).
Structure of the play
While the play is structured into three Acts, there are some off-stage acts like the killing of
Wamala and siren (danger signal) the noise outside the house.

Dramatic techniques in ‘The Burdens’

Ruganda uses a number of techniques in his play ‘The Burdens’ to pass his message to the
readers:

Dialogue.
Ruganda has used so many dialogues in the play. For instance, there is dialogue between
Tinka and Kaija at the beginning of Act One. In this dialogue, Ruganda has brought to light
the poor status of the family, e.g. Kaija complains of poor beddings and hunger.

Flashback.
E.g. Tinka and Wamala recall their happiest moments (pg, 37-38). They are helped to forget
about their suffering for a moment.

Foreshadowing.
E.g. Tinka’s threats of killing Wamala’s girl friend, threatening Wamala with imaginary pistol
and stories of drunken men stabbed to death by their jealous wives; foreshadow the death of
Wamala at the end of the play.

Play within a play (Kanagonago scene).

E.g. Tinka acting as Vincent and Wamala as sycophant/flatterer helps to highlight the conflict.

Use of sounds
E.g. Tinka’s screams show her guilt; her wailing intensely at the end could point to both her
guilt and atonement (apology).

Use of symbolism
E.g. the dream that reveals details of Kaija’s father’s murder, the regalia symbolizing his
ministerial post, the lion’s skin, and the leper’s story signifies her anger and bitterness for
having married Wamala, etc.

Tension and suspense

E.g. there is serious tension between Wamala and Tinka, tension between Tinka and the
children. At the end of the play, we are left in suspense; we know not what becomes of Tinka
and the children, etc.

Contrast
E.g. Tinka’s attitude while she talks sarcastically about Wamala, she is impressed by the actual
money he brings home and calls him a genius for his double head match idea

Use of anecdote (stories)

Tinka tells Kaija her story of how a common leper won beautiful Nyenje, the only daughter of
paramount chief, Ngoma, by climbing a tall tree and bringing down her umbilical cord.
SOME SAMPLE AND GUIDING QUESTIONS

1. Who are the burdens in The Burdens?

2. Describe the roles of Nyakake and Tinka in The Burdens

3. What major lessons do we learn from the play The Burdens?

4. Describe the characters of Wamala and Tinka; and show how they influence each other

5. Wamala is to blame for his tragic end. Discuss

6. Compare and contrast the characters of Wamala and Kaija

7. Describe any two major ideas Ruganda has brought to light in his play ‘The Burdens’

8. What techniques have Ruganda employed in writing his play ‘The Burdens’?

9. Explain the relevance of ‘The Burdens’ to the present society

10. If you were asked to take part in the play ‘The Burdens’, which character would you wish to
play; and why?

11. Does Wamala deserve to die? Why or why not?

12. Show how Kaija tries to solve his problems and how successful he is.

13. Explain the circumstances that led to the domestic strife in the Burdens.

14. Who do you sympathize with most in Ruganda’s play the Burdens

15. Who suffers most in the play: Wamala or Tinka? Why give reasons

16. “…And always remember, it was not my fault” (Pg, 81). In reference to the play, show the
circumstances that led to this statement by Tinka.

17. What is Wamala’s attitude towards his family?

18. What reasons does Wamala give for frequenting the Republic Bar?

19. Explain the relationship between husband and wife in the Burdens.

20. How does Ruganda leave the readers in suspense in his play the Burdens?