The Cup of Uwalaka: An African Gothic Play

By Onuegbu Eze

Power. Blood. Botched Love. Fate.
In The Cup of Uwalaka, Nigerian playwright Onuegbu Eze conjures a gripping African Gothic tragedy rooted in Igbo spiritual traditions and urban ambition.

Uwalaka is a Lagos patriarch blessed with wealth, reputation, and fearsome influence-but none of it came without cost. Behind his success lies a secret pact with Ofuego, a dark brotherhood of sacrifice and unseen forces. When the gods demand one final offering-his very blood-Uwalaka turns toward his poetic and spiritually gifted cousin, Anagoro. But fate, prophecy, and ancestral law intervene.

What unfolds is a haunting descent into ritual, madness, and reckoning. As thunder rumbles and old gods stir, the play unearths the terrible price of power, the illusions of control, and the terrifying clarity of spiritual justice.

Told in lyrical, philosophical language and charged with metaphysical tension, The Cup of Uwalaka is a modern classic of African theatre-a work that fuses the intensity of Marlowe's Faustus with the spiritual grandeur of Wole Soyinka.

A must-read for lovers of dramatic literature, postcolonial ritual theatre, and contemporary African storytelling.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0FL81S9R8
• ISBN13: 9798293359462
• Release Date: July 2025
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 136 Pages
• Weight: 0.31 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.0" x 8.0"