{"id":84362,"date":"2015-03-21T15:45:33","date_gmt":"2015-03-21T13:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/germistoncitynews.co.za\/84362\/five-south-african-poets-you-should-know-about\/"},"modified":"2015-03-21T15:52:40","modified_gmt":"2015-03-21T13:52:40","slug":"five-south-african-poets-you-should-know-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/lifestyle-news\/2015\/03\/21\/five-south-african-poets-you-should-know-about\/","title":{"rendered":"Five South African poets you should know about"},"content":{"rendered":"

Antjie Krog<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Biography<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Photo<\/a>
Photo sourced from ranker.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Born into an\u00a0Afrikaner\u00a0family of writers in\u00a0Kroonstad,\u00a0Orange Free State, South Africa, she grew up on a farm, attending primary and secondary school in the area.<\/p>

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In 1970, at the height of\u00a0John Vorster’s\u00a0apartheid\u00a0years, she penned an anti-apartheid poem for her school magazine:\u00a0Gee vir my ‘n land waar swart en wit hand aan hand, vrede en liefde kan bring in my mooi land<\/i>\u00a0(Give me a land where black and white hand in hand, Can bring peace and love to my beautiful land<\/i>) scandalising her conservative\u00a0Afrikaans-speaking community and bringing the attention of the national media to her parents’ doorstep:<\/p>\n

In 1973 she earned a BA (Hons mwa) degree in English from the\u00a0University of the Orange Free State, and an\u00a0MA\u00a0in Afrikaans from the\u00a0University of Pretoria\u00a0in 1976.<\/p>

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With a teaching diploma from the\u00a0University of South Africa\u00a0(UNISA) she would lecture at a segregated teacher\u2019s training college for black South Africans.<\/p>\n

Her achievements as a poet<\/h4>\n

Described by her contemporary\u00a0Joan Hambidge, as the\u00a0Pablo Neruda\u00a0of Afrikaans, Krog would publish her first book of verse,\u00a0Dogter van Jefta\u00a0(Daughter of Jephta) at the age of seventeen.Within the next two years she published a second collection titled:\u00a0Januarie-suite\u00a0(January Suite).<\/p>\n

Since then she has published several further volumes, one in English. Much of her poetry deals with love, apartheid, the role of women, and the politics of gender. Her work has been translated into English, Dutch and several other languages.<\/p>\n

Her achievements as a journalist<\/h4>\n

Later, Krog would edit the now-defunct, independent Afrikaans journal\u00a0Die Suid-Afrikaan, co-founded by\u00a0Hermann Giliomee\u00a0in 1984.<\/p>\n

On the strength of her work there, she was invited to join the\u00a0South African Broadcasting Corporation\u00a0(SABC) by Pippa Green, head of radio news. For two years, reporting as Antjie Samuel, she contributed to the radio programme\u00a0AM Live\u00a0with items on South Africa’s\u00a0Truth and Reconciliation Commission\u00a0(TRC). Of the commission she said:<\/p>\n

If its interest is linked only to amnesty and compensation, then it will have chosen not truth, but justice. If it sees truth as the widest possible compilation of people’s perceptions, stories, myths and experiences, it will have chosen to restore memory and foster a new humanity, and perhaps that is justice in its deepest sense.<\/i><\/p>\n

When the TRC hearings were completed in 1997, Krog took up the post of Parliamentary Editor at SABC.<\/p>\n

Breyten Breytenbach<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"Breyten<\/a>Breyten Breytenbach was born in\u00a0Bonnievale, Western Cape, approximately 180\u00a0km from\u00a0Cape Town\u00a0and 100\u00a0km from the southernmost tip of Africa at\u00a0Cape Agulhas. He studied\u00a0fine arts\u00a0at the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the\u00a0University of Cape Town\u00a0and became a committed opponent of the policy of\u00a0apartheid. He left South Africa for Paris in the early 1960s. When he married a French woman of Vietnamese ancestry, Yolande, he was not allowed to return<\/p>\n

On an illegal trip to South Africa in 1975 he was arrested and sentenced to seven years of\u00a0imprisonment\u00a0for\u00a0high treason: his work\u00a0The True Confessions of an Albino Terrorist<\/i>\u00a0describes aspects of his imprisonment.<\/p>\n

In June 1977 Breytenbach was brought to court by the South African Government on a new series of terrorism charges.<\/p>\n

It was alleged that he had planned a Russian submarine attack on the prison centre at Robben Island through the\u00a0Okhela<\/i>\u00a0Organisation,<\/i>\u00a0which he had allegedly founded as a resistance group fighting apartheid in\u00a0exile.<\/p>\n

After a successful defense, the judge found a total lack of evidence for the very existence of Okhela \u2013 which had been the main charge at the first trial \u2013 and so he was found not guilty on all serious charges.<\/p>\n

He was found guilty only on the technical counts of having smuggled out letters and poems, for which a nominal fine of some fifty dollars was imposed.<\/p>\n

Released in 1982 as a result of massive international intervention, he returned to Paris and obtained French citizenship.<\/p>\n

He became a visiting professor at the\u00a0University of Cape Town\u00a0in the Graduate School of Humanities in January 2000\u00a0and is also involved with the\u00a0Gor\u00e9e Institute\u00a0in\u00a0Dakar\u00a0(Senegal) and with\u00a0New York University, where he teaches in the Graduate Creative Writing Program.<\/p>\n

Breytenbach’s work includes numerous volumes of novels, poetry and essays, many of which are in\u00a0Afrikaans. Many have been translated from Afrikaans to English, and many were originally published in English. He is also known for his works of pictorial arts. Exhibitions of his paintings and prints were shown in numerous cities around the world including\u00a0Johannesburg, Cape Town, Hong Kong,\u00a0Amsterdam, Stockholm, Paris,\u00a0Brussels, Edinburgh and New York City.<\/p>\n

Breytenbach was described as the only example of a “nice South African” in the song\u00a0I’ve Never Met A Nice South African<\/i>. The song was written by\u00a0John Lloyd\u00a0for the satirical British TV series\u00a0Spitting Image<\/i>.<\/p>\n

He is the brother of\u00a0Jan Breytenbach, founder of the\u00a0South African Special Forces, and Cloete Breytenbach, a widely published\u00a0war correspondent. He is the father of the French journalist Daphnee Breytenbach.<\/p>\n

David Wright<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"David<\/a>Wright was born in\u00a0Johannesburg, South Africa 23 February 1920 of normal hearing. When he was 7 years old he contracted\u00a0scarlet fever\u00a0and was deafened as a result of the disease.<\/p>\n

He emigrated to England at the age of 14, where he was enrolled in the\u00a0Northampton School for the Deaf. He studied at\u00a0Oriel College,\u00a0Oxford, and graduated in 1942.<\/p>\n

His first work, a poem entitled\u00a0Eton Hall<\/i>, was published in 1942\u201343 in the journal\u00a0Oxford Poetry<\/i>.<\/p>\n

He became a freelance writer in 1947 after working on the\u00a0Sunday Times<\/i>\u00a0newspaper for five years. With\u00a0John Heath-Stubbs\u00a0he edited the\u00a0Faber Book of Twentieth Century Verse<\/i>.<\/p>\n

He edited the literary magazine\u00a0Nimbus<\/i>\u00a0from 1955 to 1956, during which time he published 19 poems, sent to him by\u00a0Patrick Swift, by\u00a0Patrick Kavanagh, which proved to be the turing point in Kavanagh’s career.<\/p>\n

He co-founded the quarterly literary review\u00a0X magazine<\/i>\u00a0which he co-edited from 1959 to 1962. His work includes three books about\u00a0Portugal\u00a0written with\u00a0Patrick Swift, his co-founder and co-editor of\u00a0X<\/i>. He translated\u00a0The Canterbury Tales<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0Beowulf<\/i>.<\/p>\n

He penned an autobiography in 1969, and a biography of fellow South African poet\u00a0Roy Campbell\u00a0in 1961. Wright also edited a number of publications throughout the 1960s and 1970s. He held the Gregory Fellowship in Poetry at the\u00a0University of Leeds\u00a0(1965\u201367).<\/p>\n

Wright was not reticent about his\u00a0deafness, and his autobiography,\u00a0Deafness: A Personal Account<\/i>\u00a0(1969), is often used to give hearing people an insight into an experience they might not easily imagine.<\/p>\n

In 1951, he married Philippa (“Pippa”) Reid (d. 1985); and Oonagh Swift in 1987. Wright lived in\u00a0Braithwaite, just outside\u00a0Keswick, in the\u00a0Lake District\u00a0of England, and became good friends with\u00a0Norman Nicholson, a fellow poet, and his wife, often visiting each other.<\/p>\n

Wright died of cancer in\u00a0Waldron, East Sussex, August 28, 1994.<\/p>\n

Keorapetse William Kgositsile<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"Keorapetse<\/a>Kgositsile, also known as “Bra Willie” (born September19, 1938), is a\u00a0South African\u00a0poet and political activist. An influential member of the\u00a0African National Congress\u00a0in the 1960s and 1970s, he was inaugurated as South Africa’s National Poet Laureate in 2006.<\/p>\n

Kgositsile lived in exile in the\u00a0United States\u00a0from 1962 until 1975, the peak of his literary career. He made extensive study of\u00a0African-American\u00a0literature and culture, becoming particularly interested in\u00a0jazz.<\/p>\n

During the 1970s he was a central figure among African-American poets, encouraging interest in Africa as well as the practice of poetry as a performance art; he was well known for his readings in\u00a0New York City\u00a0jazz clubs.<\/p>\n

Kgositsile was one of the first to bridge the gap between African poetry and Black poetry in the United States, and thus one of the first and most significant poets in the\u00a0Pan-African\u00a0movement. He is the father of\u00a0hip-hop\u00a0recording artist\u00a0Earl Sweatshirt, from the prominent\u00a0American\u00a0hip-hop group\u00a0Odd Future.<\/p>\n

Mzwakhe Mbuli<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"Mzwaki<\/a>Mbuli, a devout former Deacon at Apostolic Faith Mission Church in Naledi Soweto South Africa, known as “The People’s Poet, Tall man, Mbulism”, is a popular poet and\u00a0mbaqanga\u00a0singer in\u00a0South Africa.<\/p>\n

He was born in\u00a0Sophiatown\u00a0in 1958, but his family was forced to move to Soweto when the government bulldozed his home town.<\/p>\n

His works include a book of poems,\u00a0Before Dawn<\/i>\u00a0(1989), and albums\u00a0Change is Pain<\/i>\u00a0(1986),\u00a0Unbroken Spirit<\/i>\u00a0(1989),\u00a0Resistance and Defence<\/i>\u00a0(1992), and\u00a0Africa<\/i>(1993). His poems are mainly in English but draw on his native Zulu as well as traditional praise poetry and rap.<\/p>\n

His best-known poem is\u00a0Change is Pain<\/i>, a protest piece about oppression and revolution, which was initially banned until growing pressure forced South Africa to allow more freedom of speech.\u00a0His first performance group was called “Khuvhangano”.<\/p>\n

Throughout the 1980s Mzwakhe was repeatedly detained by the authorities and denied a passport to travel while playing a leading role in the Cultural activities of the\u00a0United Democratic Front.<\/p>\n

His international career began in 1990 in\u00a0Berlin, Germany\u00a0when he shared the stage with\u00a0Youssou N’dour,\u00a0Miriam Makeba\u00a0and\u00a0Thomas Mapfumo. An imposing figure, standing well over 6 feet (1.8\u00a0m) tall, he performed at the funeral of\u00a0Chris Hani, the assassinated head of the\u00a0South African Communist Party, and at the presidential inauguration\u00a0Nelson Mandela\u00a0in 1994.<\/p>\n

In 1996 Mbuli was invited to London to co-host, with British poet and activist\u00a0Benjamin Zephaniah, the Two Nations Concert at the\u00a0Albert Hall\u00a0to honor President\u00a0Nelson Mandela\u00a0on his visit to\u00a0London\u00a0. Later in the year, he returned to the UK to join\u00a0Peter Gabriel, Youssour N’dour and other prominent African artists to record the fundraising Aids Album.<\/p>\n

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