Telephone Conversation

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1963

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Themes

Miscommunication is a Game

The conversation in this poem involves several moments of silence and needs for readjustment, making their conversation one of tactics with power moves forward and backward. Soyinka refers to the speaker’s phone call as “hide-and-speak” (Line 12), wordplay on the game hide-and-seek. The first silence takes place after the speaker says, “I am African” (Line 5). This term is not clear enough because the woman eventually follows up with, “How dark?” (Line 10). The speaker has to double-check if he has heard her question correctly or not. After an “ill-mannered silence” (Line 15), the speaker asks if he has heard correctly. She asks again, and he puts into his own words, “You mean—like plain or milk chocolate?” (Line 19). When the landlady’s harsh tone seems to suggest her understanding but lack of appreciation for the comparison, the speaker readjusts and selects “West African sepia” (Line 22). When there is further confusion, the speaker tries the term “brunette” (Line 26). The speaker does not directly answer her light or dark question, constantly swerving the direction of her questions into other colorful terrain, confusing the landlady even though they speak the same language. He plays to win not only the apartment but also the conversation. However, what he likely knows is that the landlady will always win because of the larger societal game that is in her favor. Because their game of silence and questioning does not seem to reach a conclusion, the speaker takes a drastic, humorous measure to clarify his coloring, with the landlady finally getting the message and wanting to abruptly end the conversation.

The Layers of Identity

“Telephone Conversation” is ultimately about the speaker’s skin color, yet the various shades of colors Soyinka notes in this poem suggest that the race of Africans is multitudinous, from sepia to raven black to plain chocolate, as Africa has many regions, languages, tribal affiliations, and, ultimately, ways of living. This should not be new to the English landlady, who is also from a country that includes urban and country dwellers, the Queen’s English, and cockney, yet she does not see the similarities. Beyond race and national identity, the speaker is a complex human being, one who is able to analyze a person’s tone of voice on the phone: “Pressurized good-breeding” (Line 7) and one who is able to execute verbal irony with the knowledge of science, i.e., the joke about his bottom being black from friction, to make a point about the foolishness of skin color as a criteria for becoming a tenant. Additionally, the speaker is also one who can afford the apartment he is seeking, which suggests he has steady employment. Even before the landlady considers asking any of the standard application questions involving employment, references, and so on, she begins with race and, in fact, ends at race. To sum up a person’s entire being in one color obviously would prove futile, which seems to be what Soyinka is illustrating in this poem. Not only the speaker but the landlady has multiple dimensions. For example, she has elements of a high status and, as the speaker notes, good breeding, such as a “long gold-rolled” cigarette holder (Line 8), which might suggest intelligent responses as well. However, the foolish words that come from her mouth reduce another human being to a binary of light or dark rather than the array of colors a person can study during a “spectroscopic” silence (Line 23).

The Subjectiveness of Color

It is easy to say the landlady is racist. She does probe into the precise coloring of the speaker’s skin, suggesting she might take an African tenant who has light skin. This idea of examining shades elucidates the concept of colorism, or shadeism, which most commonly exists among people of the same racial and ethnic makeup showing prejudice for those darker in complexion. The history of colorism in Africa goes back to the times of British colonization, when individuals with lighter skin received more privileges than people with darker skin. In the poem, an African man is in an English country of his own accord, willing to spend his own money for an apartment, but his money, because of his complexion, is not good enough. The words the speaker uses to clarify his color and whether that color is light or dark takes up the bulk of the poem’s content. To quibble over the lightness or darkness of the term “brunette” shows the subjective nature of the topic. If one person sees light and the other person sees medium in a particular color, it is challenging to determine who is right unless there is a third party to break the tie. In “Telephone Conversation,” only two people are present, with the party being examined suggesting that the other see him for herself. The end result, whether she determines if he is, in fact, light or dark, is not based on science but individual perspective.