Bikman Edipusu: Oedipus Rex by Sophocles in Solomon Islands Pijin
Channel: Hugh x
Date: 2021-10-03

Bikman Edipusu: Sophocles' classic tragedy Oedipus Rex as performed on Solomon Islands Radio in Solomon Islands Pijin in 1976 (hence the poor sound quality) with English titles and some pictures.

Bikman Edipusu: stori fo mek iumi sori tumas, wea Sofoklis i raetem lōng taem go finis, an mifala i wokem long Solomons Redio long iia 1976, wetem Inglis stori anatap semtaem an samfala piksa.

Synopsis: Before Edipusu was born, a curse was put on his father through him. His parents tried to thwart that curse, but only succeeded in bringing down another. He tried to thwart both curses, bringing down the catastrophe that plays out here.

Solomon Islands Pijin is a Melanesian contact language spoken as a second or first language by about 500,000 people. (It is distinct from Tok Pisin of PNG.) Much of its vocabulary is borrowed (but modified) from English, its grammar Melanesian. Some Pijin words may sound like baby talk to non-speakers (because early colonials would talk down to the locals in English) so I have translated it back into English titles to give the actual meaning. Some of the Pijin words used here are obsolete today for that reason.

One reason for making this very serious play in Pijin was to establish that it is a full-blown language, and the play is outside the Christian canon, in which most non-utilitarian Pijin was written in 1976.

The translation is from Watling's English version of 1947. My full Pigin translation was published in a limited edition in 1987. This radio play is cut down, missing most of the meditative choruses that frame the scenes, but it retains all the narrative.