A tribute to Andrew van der Vlies, outgoing Lead Editor for Safundi

Abstract

The year 2020 was one of loss and mourning for most all of us. That feeling is compounded for us at Safundi by the departure of our Lead Editor. It is hard to convey how important Andrew van der Vlies has been to the operations and the identity of Safundi for more than a decade. Having spent three years as Reviews editor, he became one of the coeditors in 2010, and then stepped into the role of Lead Editor in 2014 when the founding editor, Andrew Offenburger, resigned. Now Andrew van der Vlies in turn is stepping down from the editorial team as he prepares for a move to Australia to take up a professorship at the University of Adelaide. In her moving address to the African Literature Association annual meeting in 2018, Carli Coetzee borrowed the metaphor of “holding the door open for others” for thinking about the ethics of journal editing and