Book of Knowledge and Great Understanding

This particular volume of the boyhood works, in two parts, reveals the early philosophical musing of Udenta O. Udenta, even as a secondary school boy, leading him to make apt pronouncements such as:

“Malignant and anarchic problems will face a country with ethnic and tribal affliction and jingoism if the leader is not iron-willed and without leadership acumen” and “The unification principle, if lacked by the operators of any government, will see a state of chaos, perennial ethnic chauvinism, where jingoistic tribal affiliations have taken a deep root.” Have we not been living with these all along in Nigeria?

The philosophical sketches of an exceptionally gifted boy gives way in the second part to the narration of the many spectacles of the author’s experience as a student of the Awgu High School, Nenwe presently in Enugu State but formerly known as Awgu County Secondary School in the old Anambra State. The acute attention to details, moral comments on aspects of school life and the journal-like approach in mediating realities of school life that appear significant to him are reflective of a maturing artistic and intellectual consciousness well ahead of his age. The school life reflections end with an incisive account by a contemporary of the author at the secondary school, Patrick Isiogwu, who narrated the many instances of how the then young Lawrence Udenta, popularly known as “Kill Master” in school, intellectually confounded his mates, teachers and examiners even as a secondary school student.