Semiotic Content of Myth in Literature

Abstract

Literary works of every land and clime are heavily weighted in semiotic features as linguistic evidence. Even language in itself is a semiotic feature. Semiotic features are consciously or unconsciously, wittingly or unwittingly woven into literary works by literary writers to make thematic statement. At times, issues that border on public morality are consciously woven around semiotic issues of myth, whereby critics and readers of literary works are left to unravel and interpret the latent content of such features. These semiotic features, in some cases, are presented as linguistic features of myth, which abound in African Literature. This essay, therefore, attempts to excavate semiotic issues of myth encapsulated in literary works of African literary writers, using selected works of Achebe and (Chukwuemeka) Ike as test cases. Precisely the literary works of these writers that will be used for this study are Things Fall Apart, NoLonger at Ease, hereafter TFA and NLAE, respectively and The Porter’s Wheel and The Bottled Leopard, hereafter referred to as TPW and TBL, respectively. Of course, literary texts of other African creative writers will be cited to corroborate our assertions and submissions. The semiotic issues of myth that will be investigated in this study are ogbanje, iyiuwa or ogbanje stone,osu, reincarnation and some other supernatural phenomena.