Wycliffe Kiyingi (1929 â€" 15 November 2014) was a Ugandan playwright
whose plays influenced the free travelling theatre at Makerere
University in the mid-1960s. He was the first Ugandan to stage a play
at the National Theatre in 1953, with his play Pio Mbereenge Kamulaali
â€" the first in a local language to be staged at the National
Theatre. Kiyingi formed the country’s first theatre group to
comprise native Ugandans; the African Artistes Association.The group
adopted the mode of a travelling theatre, taking its productions to
different parts of the central region. It is from there that other
theatre groups (such as the Makerere Free Travelling Theatre of the
1960s) got inspiration, leading to the development of a fully-fledged
local theatre movement in the country. He was also the pioneer native
writer of radio and TV drama in Uganda in the late 1950s.Kiyingi was
born to Ernest Kaggwe in 1929. He went to King's College Budo. During
pre-independence Uganda, colonial governor Andrew Cohen granted him a
scholarship to study drama at Bristol University from where he further
polished his skills at Oxford University in London.He wrote more than
ten books that have been widely translated and many directed into
plays and others adopted into both the secondary and university
syllabi. Some of his Luganda plays include; Gwosussa Emmwanyi, Lozio
Bba Ssesiriya, Olugendo lw'e Gologoosa, Muduuma Kwe Kwaffe, Ssempala
bba mukyala Ssempala and the radio play Wókulira, which ran on the
then Radio Uganda for close to two decades.
whose plays influenced the free travelling theatre at Makerere
University in the mid-1960s. He was the first Ugandan to stage a play
at the National Theatre in 1953, with his play Pio Mbereenge Kamulaali
â€" the first in a local language to be staged at the National
Theatre. Kiyingi formed the country’s first theatre group to
comprise native Ugandans; the African Artistes Association.The group
adopted the mode of a travelling theatre, taking its productions to
different parts of the central region. It is from there that other
theatre groups (such as the Makerere Free Travelling Theatre of the
1960s) got inspiration, leading to the development of a fully-fledged
local theatre movement in the country. He was also the pioneer native
writer of radio and TV drama in Uganda in the late 1950s.Kiyingi was
born to Ernest Kaggwe in 1929. He went to King's College Budo. During
pre-independence Uganda, colonial governor Andrew Cohen granted him a
scholarship to study drama at Bristol University from where he further
polished his skills at Oxford University in London.He wrote more than
ten books that have been widely translated and many directed into
plays and others adopted into both the secondary and university
syllabi. Some of his Luganda plays include; Gwosussa Emmwanyi, Lozio
Bba Ssesiriya, Olugendo lw'e Gologoosa, Muduuma Kwe Kwaffe, Ssempala
bba mukyala Ssempala and the radio play Wókulira, which ran on the
then Radio Uganda for close to two decades.
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