Death and the King’s Horseman

by

Wole Soyinka

Simon Pilkings Character Analysis

The district officer in the colonial Nigerian city of Oyo. He's self-important, pompous, and has no time for the native religious practices, which he refers to as "nonsense" and "mumbo-jumbo." Because he thinks so little of the Yoruba religion and the people, he sees no problem with wearing the egungun to a costume party a few weeks after confiscating the costumes from the leaders of the egungun cult of the dead. Pilkings is cruel and callous to everyone who is (or who he believes is) below him in the hierarchy. This includes Elesin and Amusa, as well as his wife, Jane. He's especially dismissive of Jane's attempts to make him understand the importance of being sensitive to the local culture and customs, and shouts at her to stop interfering with his work. Pilkings only takes Elesin's suicide so seriously because the prince of England is visiting, and because of that, Pilkings feels that he has to look competent and in control in front of his superiors. His manner implies that the rest of the time, he takes control when the mood strikes him or when it suits him to do so, and simply behaves rudely and derisively the rest of the time. Though Pilkings says that Elesin dying wouldn't be a great loss—he's had run-ins with Elesin in the past and finds Elesin difficult to deal with and annoyingly entrenched in native customs—Pilkings does fully believe in the Christian idea that suicide is a sin. To this end, Pilkings does his best to stop Elesin's death, and succeeds. He tells Elesin that he's doing his duty by saving him, and refuses to consider that he's actually doing Elesin and the local people a major disservice.

Simon Pilkings Quotes in Death and the King’s Horseman

The Death and the King’s Horseman quotes below are all either spoken by Simon Pilkings or refer to Simon Pilkings. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Life and Death Theme Icon
).
Act 2 Quotes

Pilkings: Nonsense, he's a Moslem. Come on, Amusa, you don't believe in all this nonsense do you? I thought you were a good Moslem.

Amusa: Mista Pirinkin, I beg you sir, what you think you do with that dress? It belong to dead cult, not for human being.

Pilkings: Oh Amusa, what a let down you are. I swear by you at the club you know—thank God for Amusa, he doesn't believe in any mumbo-jumbo. And now look at you!

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Sergeant Amusa (speaker), Jane Pilkings
Page Number: 24
Explanation and Analysis:

Jane: But Simon, do they really give anything away? I mean, anything that really counts. This affair for instance, we didn't know they still practised the custom did we?

Pilkings: Ye-e-es, I suppose you're right there. Sly, devious bastards.

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Jane Pilkings (speaker), Elesin, Sergeant Amusa
Page Number: 29
Explanation and Analysis:

Jane: Simon, you really must watch your language. Bastard isn't just a simple swear-word in these parts, you know.

Pilkings: Look, just when did you become a social anthropologist, that's what I'd like to know.

Jane: I'm not claiming to know anything. I just happen to have overheard quarrels among the servants. That's how I know they consider it a smear.

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Jane Pilkings (speaker), Joseph
Page Number: 30
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 4 Quotes

Resident: You should have kept me informed Pilkings. You realise how disastrous it would have been if things had erupted while His Highness was here.

Pilkings: I wasn't aware of the whole business until tonight sir.

Resident: Nose to the ground Pilkings, nose to the ground. If we all let these little things slip past us where would the empire be eh? Tell me that. Where would we all be?

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), The Resident (speaker), Elesin, The Prince
Page Number: 47
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 5 Quotes

Elesin: You did not save my life District Officer. You destroyed it.

Pilkings: Now come on...

Elesin: And not merely my life but the lives of many. The end of the night's work is not over. Neither this year nor the next will see it. If I wished you well, I would pray that you do not stay long enough on our land to see the disaster you have brought upon us.

Pilkings: Well, I did my duty as I saw fit. I have no regrets.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings (speaker)
Related Symbols: Chains
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis:

You did not fail in the main thing ghostly one. We know the roof covers the rafters, the cloth covers blemishes; who would have known that the white skin covered our future, preventing us from seeing the death our enemies had prepared for us. The world is set adrift and its inhabitants are lost. Around them, there is nothing but emptiness.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Page Number: 63
Explanation and Analysis:

You were the final gift of the living to their emissary to the land of the ancestors, and perhaps your warmth and youth brought new insights of this world to me and turned my feet leaden on this side of the abyss. For I confess to you, daughter, my weakness came not merely from the abomination of the white man who came violently into my fading presence, there was also a weight of longing on my earth-held limbs. I would have shaken it off, already my foot had begun to lift but then, the white ghost entered and all was defiled.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings, The Bride / The Young Woman
Page Number: 65
Explanation and Analysis:

It is when the alien hand pollutes the source of will, when a stranger force of violence shatters the mind's calm resolution, this is when a man is made to commit the awful treachery of relief, commit in his thought the unspeakable blasphemy of seeing the hand of the gods in this alien rupture of his world. I know it was this thought that killed me, sapped my powers and turned me into an infant in the hands of unnamable strangers.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Iyaloja, Simon Pilkings
Page Number: 69
Explanation and Analysis:

Elesin: Go to the gates, ghostly one. Whatever you find there, bring it to me.

Iyaloja: Not yet. It drags behind me on the slow, weary feet of women. Slow as it is, Elesin, it has long overtaken you. It rides ahead of your laggard will.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Iyaloja (speaker), Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Page Number: 71
Explanation and Analysis:

No child, it is what you brought to be, you who play with strangers' lives, who even usurp the vestments of our dead, yet believe that the stain of death will not cling to you. The gods demanded only the old expired plantain but you cut down the sap-laden shoot to feed your pride. There is your board, filled to overflowing. Feast on it.

Related Characters: Iyaloja (speaker), Elesin, Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Related Symbols: Chains
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis:
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Simon Pilkings Quotes in Death and the King’s Horseman

The Death and the King’s Horseman quotes below are all either spoken by Simon Pilkings or refer to Simon Pilkings. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Life and Death Theme Icon
).
Act 2 Quotes

Pilkings: Nonsense, he's a Moslem. Come on, Amusa, you don't believe in all this nonsense do you? I thought you were a good Moslem.

Amusa: Mista Pirinkin, I beg you sir, what you think you do with that dress? It belong to dead cult, not for human being.

Pilkings: Oh Amusa, what a let down you are. I swear by you at the club you know—thank God for Amusa, he doesn't believe in any mumbo-jumbo. And now look at you!

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Sergeant Amusa (speaker), Jane Pilkings
Page Number: 24
Explanation and Analysis:

Jane: But Simon, do they really give anything away? I mean, anything that really counts. This affair for instance, we didn't know they still practised the custom did we?

Pilkings: Ye-e-es, I suppose you're right there. Sly, devious bastards.

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Jane Pilkings (speaker), Elesin, Sergeant Amusa
Page Number: 29
Explanation and Analysis:

Jane: Simon, you really must watch your language. Bastard isn't just a simple swear-word in these parts, you know.

Pilkings: Look, just when did you become a social anthropologist, that's what I'd like to know.

Jane: I'm not claiming to know anything. I just happen to have overheard quarrels among the servants. That's how I know they consider it a smear.

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), Jane Pilkings (speaker), Joseph
Page Number: 30
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 4 Quotes

Resident: You should have kept me informed Pilkings. You realise how disastrous it would have been if things had erupted while His Highness was here.

Pilkings: I wasn't aware of the whole business until tonight sir.

Resident: Nose to the ground Pilkings, nose to the ground. If we all let these little things slip past us where would the empire be eh? Tell me that. Where would we all be?

Related Characters: Simon Pilkings (speaker), The Resident (speaker), Elesin, The Prince
Page Number: 47
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 5 Quotes

Elesin: You did not save my life District Officer. You destroyed it.

Pilkings: Now come on...

Elesin: And not merely my life but the lives of many. The end of the night's work is not over. Neither this year nor the next will see it. If I wished you well, I would pray that you do not stay long enough on our land to see the disaster you have brought upon us.

Pilkings: Well, I did my duty as I saw fit. I have no regrets.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings (speaker)
Related Symbols: Chains
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis:

You did not fail in the main thing ghostly one. We know the roof covers the rafters, the cloth covers blemishes; who would have known that the white skin covered our future, preventing us from seeing the death our enemies had prepared for us. The world is set adrift and its inhabitants are lost. Around them, there is nothing but emptiness.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Page Number: 63
Explanation and Analysis:

You were the final gift of the living to their emissary to the land of the ancestors, and perhaps your warmth and youth brought new insights of this world to me and turned my feet leaden on this side of the abyss. For I confess to you, daughter, my weakness came not merely from the abomination of the white man who came violently into my fading presence, there was also a weight of longing on my earth-held limbs. I would have shaken it off, already my foot had begun to lift but then, the white ghost entered and all was defiled.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Simon Pilkings, The Bride / The Young Woman
Page Number: 65
Explanation and Analysis:

It is when the alien hand pollutes the source of will, when a stranger force of violence shatters the mind's calm resolution, this is when a man is made to commit the awful treachery of relief, commit in his thought the unspeakable blasphemy of seeing the hand of the gods in this alien rupture of his world. I know it was this thought that killed me, sapped my powers and turned me into an infant in the hands of unnamable strangers.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Iyaloja, Simon Pilkings
Page Number: 69
Explanation and Analysis:

Elesin: Go to the gates, ghostly one. Whatever you find there, bring it to me.

Iyaloja: Not yet. It drags behind me on the slow, weary feet of women. Slow as it is, Elesin, it has long overtaken you. It rides ahead of your laggard will.

Related Characters: Elesin (speaker), Iyaloja (speaker), Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Page Number: 71
Explanation and Analysis:

No child, it is what you brought to be, you who play with strangers' lives, who even usurp the vestments of our dead, yet believe that the stain of death will not cling to you. The gods demanded only the old expired plantain but you cut down the sap-laden shoot to feed your pride. There is your board, filled to overflowing. Feast on it.

Related Characters: Iyaloja (speaker), Elesin, Simon Pilkings, Olunde
Related Symbols: Chains
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis: