A Story to Tell

Abstract

Although Sol Plaatje died in 1932 with many of his hopes for South Africa unfulfilled, he has not been forgotten by his fellow South Africans. In a new edition of his biography of Plaatje, Brian Willan, one of the scholars whose work revived interest in Plaatje in the 1980s, has written the life of a great South African for the new South Africa. He has made use of newly discovered documentary sources and oral memory and given us a nuanced account of a complex life. Despite suffering many disappointments and indignities, Plaatje left his countrymen and –women a rich legacy. The centenary of Native Life in South Africa (1916), still perhaps his best-known work, was celebrated in a collection of essays which testify to that work’s profound reach and continuing relevance. Plaatje continues to speak to South Africa in a way we can all understand.

Keywords:

• Plaatje
• segregation
• apartheid
• the new South Africa
• Native Life

Notes on Contributor

Tony Voss taught in South African universities until his retirement from the service of the University of Natal in 1995. He is now a Research Associate of Nelson Mandela University, Port Elizabeth, and his research interests are in South African Literature and Shakespeare. His first volume of verse, The Mushroom Summer of Skipper Darling, will be published in 2019.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The first president of the new South Africa was addressing John Langalibalele Dube (1871-1946), founding president of the African National Congress. Nelson Mandela had chosen to cast his first vote in Inanda, Kwazulu-Natal, at Ohlange High School, founded in 1900 as the Ohlange Institute by Dube and his wife Nokutela.