Oluwatosin Akinrinde’s Critical Voice in Out-of-School Children and Other Stories

Reviewed by​Dr. Patrick Oloko 

Oluwatosin Akinrinde’s Out-of-School Children and Other Stories is a collection that exerts an undeniable struggle of living under tension in Nigeria—a more vitriolic yet subtle attack on politics, thuggery, hypocrisy, dishonesty, negligence, suppression, oppression, marginalisation and the decadence that have engulfed both the Nigerian state and its citizens. 

The title of the collection, “Out-of-School Children and Other Stories”, explicitly creates a morbid sense of displacement, floating narratives of incomplete or unsatisfactory personal and public trajectories in a less coherent community. 

One cannot feign ignorance of the colloquial and local infusion that coloured the narratives to make them plausible. The stories in this collection are deeply laced with narratives that raise conscious awareness of the grim social battles—an encrustation of systemic manipulation and economic oppression. 

The presentation of dialogues and conversations in the local Pidgin language brings reality to the limelight—the very fact that the poor citizens of Nigeria are swallowed by abject poverty that offers no chance for education. The disillusionment inherent in the stories smells of lopsided fear of a failed system—both of self and nation.

 The most intriguing moral degeneration portrayed by Akinrinde is the protagonist’s ‘loss of voice’—a motif discernible in all the characters’ trajectories of experiences. No doubt, Akinrinde’s stories reveal heightened falsehood that stifles human existence and economic survival. 

The beauty of this anthology is also sipped from the varied selection of characters from different cultural contexts in Nigeria to critically enhance a holistic perspective in human survival and relationships.

The first story in the collection, “Out-of-School Children”, tells the annihilating story of Deni Jaxson, a 29-year-old aspiring journalist struggling to get his articles published. Despite multiple rejections from The Prime’s newspaper, he remains determined to write about the plight of out-of-school children in Fesoko, a region plagued by poverty, insecurity, and political exploitation. 

The title of this story presents clarity deeply connected to the experiences of the characters—a narrative that arises from a historical dimension in the problems of the Nigerian contemporary society. Akinrinde touches on the issues of betrayal, class dichotomy and poverty.  

The voices of characters like Deni, Aliyu, Fatima, and Zainab thus become the collective voice of the Nigerian people who have suffered economic hardships through shared oppressive experiences in violence, poverty, early marriage, frustration and corruption—the physical dimension of human conditions that limit the possibility of pursuing education or success. In addition, we must see the characters’ self-realisation from a surreal perspective—a sense of diminishing optimism in personal ambition.

 Therefore, it would be right to say that Oluwatosin Akinrinde’s “Out-of-School Children” moves towards a Marxist Sociological Criticism with a special Feminist focus that cries out against female limitation, subjugation and oppression. 

Considering Deni’s struggle as a self-taught writer whose article got rejected several times with such tension, one can deliberately say that his narrative blurs the boundaries between fiction and reportage, turning Deni’s unfinished article into the centrepiece of the story. 

One implication of Akinrinde’s narrative is the use of the Stream-of-Consciousness technique as a relevant stylistic feature. The reader would notice that the narrative often follows Deni’s unfiltered thoughts, moving abruptly from his article to musings on philosophy, politics, and relationships.

 The extract here presents clarity on the above-mentioned issue: “He quickly perished the thought rummaging through his mind and claimed that he was an influenced writer in statu pupillari to V.I. Lenin, Josef Stalin and Leon Trotsky.” Notably, the foregoing indicates a stylistic approach that conveyed the exploration of his character’s mind, the environment and the related meanings that manifest in certain theoretical answers connected to human psychology and trauma.

There is also the visibility of Intertextuality in the narrative—an approach that made references to Homer, Socrates, Plato, Lenin, Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg, and Chimamanda Adichie to enrich the stylistic flavour of the story. This stylistic approach, without doubt, reveals Deni’s intellectual pretensions. 

Therefore, a good reader cannot fail to notice Akinrinde’s excessive description of objects. To explore deep meanings, he piles adjectives, repetitions, and rhythmic word patterns to create vivid, sometimes overwhelming imagery, such as bedsheet, bedsheet-pillowed-blanket, blanket-pillowed-bedsheet.”

 In fact, his conversational tone has helped to illuminate and clarify certain truths about human existence and actions presented in everyday English and Nigerian Pidgin, contrasting with the heavy philosophical musings. No wonder the reader notices his massive use of Imagery and Symbolism in depicting Deni’s cluttered room~ the peeling walls, cockroaches, old food, etc. 

All these are symbolic—a description which reveals his inner chaos and struggle to rise above mediocrity. Perhaps, the readers would perceive Akinrinde’s narrative as a Poetic Prose – a narrative with a long, repetitive mimic poetry structure that creates rhythm: “Fishful, meatful, bowlful, spoonful”. Notably, “Out-of-School Children” is a Metafiction.

 The story shifts between ‘First and Third Person Consciousness’, although it has been told in the third person, the narration often slips into Deni’s inner voice, giving a confessional and reflective tone. Perhaps the story consistently reflects on itself as a piece of writing.

 Within the narrative, Deni questions why his article isn’t publishable, thereby drawing attention to the act of writing itself. For example: “He thought out loud that the five ‘w’s and h’ questions had been answered, so what the goddamn was wrong with his piece?” Therefore, it must be conceded that the use of non-linear digressions, instead of a straight plot, pushes the narrative to drift between his article, tutoring lessons, romantic entanglements, and political reflections.

In another story entitled “Arewa”, we perceive a socially conscious short story narrated with a blending of reportage and creative nonfiction that documents the lives of Northern Nigerian beggars like Amina Mumuni (Iya-Ibeji) and her children, as well as other families displaced by poverty, divorce, and cultural practices. 

The title of the narrative, “Arewa”, is a Hausa word—a pointer to exposing the realities of Hausa migrants in Lagos alongside Yoruba traders, highlighting Nigeria’s ethnic coexistence and subtle tensions. No doubt, the narration drifts fluidly between personal testimonies of Mumuni’s divorce, Sule’s struggles with education, the Bauchi couple’s hunger and other structural commentaries that expose the multidimensional nature of poverty in Nigeria—thus situating suffering within Nigeria’s broader socio-economic crisis. With this narrative, we still perceive Akinrinde’s Marxist concern vividly integrated in the narratives.

The Marxist undertone in Akinrinde’s fictional stories is definitely consistent. In the entitled “The Lanterns of Allen Avenue”, we perceive a deep sense of woven realism, symbolism, and social criticism into a narrative of survival, resistance, and cautious hope. The story blends Chioma’s narrative to reflect ga endered perspective wrapped around feminist struggle for female liberation from bodily servitude and exploitation occasioned by the harsh realities in Nigeria. 

The narrative contrasts wealth and poverty, dreams and reality, survival and dignity. The thematic concern visible in the narrative smells of female exploitation. Notably, the commodification of Chioma’s body. In the “Shadows of the Lagos Night”, the readers can categorically perceive that the writer has fused gritty urban realism with moral allegory, which painted the male protagonist’s struggle (Adewale’s struggle) as both personal and public—a clear representative voice or epitome of citizens in the contemporary Nigerian society, where survival often collides with ethics. With the motifs of economic survival, crime and moral laxity, the readers’ concentration becomes deeply familiar with Akinrinde’s language of narration.

“The Cost of Flight”, as one of the stories in the anthology, does not leave the readers unconnected to the author’s thematic concerns on the Nigerian economic hardship and the massive migration of the country’s best brains for survival. The story of Nneka, a medical personnel at LUTH, presents the duality of human emotions. Her narrative has mapped out the ‘Japa motif’ which subtly balances hope (better pay, saving lives) with guilt (abandoning patients, family). 

The realities of Musa’s story in “The Dust of Dreams” are not divorced from the harsh realities of Nigeria as a social context. Within the narrative filled with youthful quest, we perceive the glaring theme of deep poverty, which culminated in crimes and abuse of drugs by the protagonist. 

Notably, Musa’s plight is a reflection of the systemic corruption that has eaten deep into the Nigerian social circles. His addiction to drugs is hinged on poverty and shattered dreams—the ambition of becoming a pilot, which was eclipsed by hawking goods at the roadsides. This exposure connotes a negative influence which forced his sane mentality to street mentality, leading to crime and substance abuse. Within the narrative, the writer offers the hope of revival for addicts through correctional facilities and shared human relationships. 

Again, the “Echoes of the Green Card” presents the reality of the Nigerian immigrants in America to depict a diasporic narrative with apt vividness. Chukwudi’s story as a protagonist reveals the pathetic conditions of Nigerians as international students who are burdened with family pressure, visa payments and tuition completion within their new world of survival. 

This diasporic narrative is a pointer to the migration issues caused by push-pull factors necessitated by the Nigerian economic negative issues. No wonder the author reveals the character’s entanglement with crime and drug addiction as a means of survival. It is worth noting that the linguistic pattern adopted in this narrative combines native slogans with good expressions in English to heighten the realities of human conditions. 

Akinrinde’s narrative space transcends depiction in one genre of literature. His anthology also presents a memorable entry into the world of drama. The discernible pattern he took in depicting dialogues in plays accommodates the persistent thematic concerns of his short stories.

 In the play “Let Them Die Alone”, he depicts with authoritative muse of unfavourable conditions caused by violence, ethnic conflicts, death and hardship within the Bokkos community in Plateau State, Nigeria. The structuring of the events in the play is captured in three distinct sequences marked by nature’s declining movement of time: Night, Noon, and Morning—a psychological movement which traces the decline of happiness and freedom in a once happy community ravaged by ethnic wars and death. 

The play employs the voice of eyewitnesses to comment on the stark realities of Northern Nigeria—a reportage style of narrative which smells of realism. The depiction does not fall short of socio-political trauma, which captures the interpretation of human oppression from psychological, sociological, and feminist perspectives. 

In “Motunde bring Elon Musk home” –a play packaged as a comic depiction- we perceive the shift of ideology within the motif of moral degeneration necessitated by diasporic mentality and globalisation. The play is a satire on the Gen Z mentality—a form of caricature on the folly of human want and excessiveness. 

The playwright depicts the consequences of high-tech fantasies exhibited by Motunde, a Gen Z and the notable stance of Daddy Wa as a wealthy traditionalist with inherent African values. In another play, Akinrinde’s “My Sister” brings to focus a critical female attention directed towards exposing female vulnerability and exploitation. 

One suspects that men who wield power exploit unsuspecting women. The centrality of the play schematizes the Woman (darling) as the exploited, the Prophet (Religious authority) as the sexual predator, the Husband (Honey) as the accuser, the Elder and Younger as the observers who comment on the reality of human experiences. 

In the text, the playwright has explored the issues of infidelity and religious pretence as common domestic phenomena within the Nigerian cultural contexts—factors replete with a lack of morals. From the exploration of the selected short stories and plays, we can boldly assert that Oluwatosin Akinrinde’s anthology mobilises the readers’ consciousness through Marxist ideological stances—the need to recognise the agents of oppression and offer adequate confrontation for resolution.

Book Title: ​​​Out-of-School Children and Other Stories

Author: ​​​Oluwatosin Akinrinde

Publisher: ​​​Academic Publishing Centre, University of Lagos (UNILAG)

Year of Publication: ​​2025

Reviewer:​​​Dr. Patrick Oloko (Visiting Professor of African Literature, Yale University & Professor of African Literature, University of Lagos [UNILAG])

Reviewer’s Email Address:​patrick.oloko@yale.edu; poloko@unilag.edu.ng