Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901413
N. Sithole
While RRR Dhlomo (Rolfes Robert Reginald Dhlomo) is known for being the first black South African to publish a novella in English, An African Tragedy (1928), and for having published English short stories in Sjambok and The Bantu World in the late 1920s and early 1930s, he made a greater impact on isiZulu literature as a historical and fictional novelist. In this essay I am concerned with Dhlomo’s fictional writing in English and isiZulu, exploring his development as a writer not only of An African Tragedy and the short stories in Sjambok and The Bantu World but also of his isiZulu novel, Indlela Yababi (The Path of the Wicked) (1946). I argue that Indlela Yababi is the development or revision of An African Tragedy even though it is written in a different language, his mother tongue, uses different characters, and the situation is somewhat altered. Dhlomo’s writing engages with the plight of black people in South Africa from the 1920s to the 1940s, looking mainly at the impact of urbanisation and the state’s urban control laws. Because he keeps revisiting certain significant issues in his writing, reading his English and isiZulu writing is more illuminating and rewarding.
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1910372
Duncan Brown, Antjie Krog
This Special Issue of Current Writing on “Translating (South) African Literatures” takes as its main focus what we described in the Call for Papers as “one of the most significant interventions in the field of South African literature in recent decades”: the publication by Oxford University Press in its Africa Pulse series (2018) of eight translations or retranslations into English of key African language literary texts from southern Africa. The series comprises: The Lawsuit of the Twins (1914) and Don Jadu (1929) by SEK Mqhayi; No Matter When (1935) by BW Vilakazi; Home is Nowhere (1996) by MJ Mngadi; She’s to Blame (1960) by BM Khaketla; Senkatana (1952) by SMMofokeng; Tears of the Brain (1968) by OK Motsepe; and Stitching a Whirlwind: An Anthology of Southern African Poems and Translations (2018), edited by Megan Hall and Antjie Krog. The initial translation project was funded by the National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, and co-ordinated by Antjie Krog through the Centre for Multilingualism and Diversities Research (CMDR) at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), with translation work by Thokozile Mabeqa, Nosisi Mpolweni, Thenjiswa Ntwana, Nakanjani G Sibiya, Nkosinathi Sithole, Biki Lepota, Tšepiso Samuel Mothibi, Stephen Masote, Koos Oosthuysen, Fred Khumalo, David wa Maahlamela, Gabeba Baderoon, Loyiso Mletshe, Zukile Jama, Johannes Lenake, Ncedile Saule, Rita Barnard, Seleka Tembani and Lucy Ndlovu. The Special Issue seeks to stimulate critical debate about African language literatures and their ‘translations’, with an emphasis on the southern African context, but pursuing also the transnational reach, resonances and connections of many of the texts. It is therefore significant, and thrilling to us, that these texts from various indigenous languages are now for the first time being put into scholarly conversation with one another as well as with other South African texts. Although some of these texts have been analysed by scholars specialising in one or other of the indigenous languages, they may now be placed in new, less ‘bordered’ conversations with one another. This provides a much needed continuity for the source text, giving it a ‘second life’ as a more integral part of the broader South African literary history and present. In the true sense of the word, translation has rescued some of these texts, especially the poems, from obscurity, enabling them to survive for a new set of readers, and to speak to a new set of scholars from various languages. It is perhaps significant, then, that this Special Issue also moves slightly beyond its initial focus on the Africa Pulse series, to consider other writers dealing with the same, or analogous, issues (Sithole’s focus on the work of RRR Dhlomo, for example). The Special Issue itself was conceptualised and supported by the AWMellon funded project on “Rethinking South African Literature(s)”, based in the CMDR at UWC. This is a collaborative, multilingual, interdisciplin
本期《当代写作》关于“翻译(南非)非洲文学”的特刊，主要关注的是我们在征文中所描述的“近几十年来南非文学领域最重要的干预之一”:牛津大学出版社在其《非洲脉动》系列(2018年)中出版了八本由南部非洲主要非洲语言文学文本翻译或重新翻译成英语的作品。该系列包括:双胞胎的诉讼(1914)和唐·贾杜(1929)由SEK Mqhayi;无论何时(1935)，作者BW Vilakazi;《无处可归》(1996)，作者:MJ·姆加迪;BM·卡凯特拉的《她该受责备》(1960);SMMofokeng的《Senkatana》(1952);《脑之泪》(1968)，作者:OK Motsepe;以及梅根·霍尔和安特杰·克罗格编辑的《拼接旋风:南非诗歌与翻译选集》(2018年)。最初的翻译项目由国家人文和社会科学研究所资助，由Antjie Krog通过西开普省大学(UWC)的多语言和多样性研究中心(CMDR)协调，由Thokozile Mabeqa, Nosisi Mpolweni, Thenjiswa Ntwana, Nakanjani G Sibiya, Nkosinathi Sithole, Biki Lepota, Tšepiso Samuel Mothibi, Stephen Masote, oos Oosthuysen, Fred Khumalo, David wa Maahlamela, Gabeba Baderoon，Loyiso Mletshe, Zukile Jama, Johannes Lenake, Ncedile Saule, Rita Barnard, Seleka Tembani和Lucy Ndlovu。本期特刊旨在激发关于非洲语言文学及其“翻译”的批判性辩论，重点是南部非洲的背景，但也追求许多文本的跨国影响、共鸣和联系。因此，这些来自各种土著语言的文本现在第一次被置于彼此之间以及与其他南非文本的学术对话中，这对我们来说意义重大，令人兴奋。尽管其中一些文本已经被专门研究一种或另一种土著语言的学者分析过，但它们现在可能被放在新的、更少“边界”的对话中。这为源文本提供了非常需要的连续性，使其成为更广泛的南非文学史和现在的“第二次生命”。在这个词的真正意义上，翻译拯救了这些文本中的一些，尤其是诗歌，从默默无闻，使他们能够生存下来，为新的读者，并与来自不同语言的新的学者交谈。因此，值得注意的是，本期特刊也略微超越了最初对《非洲脉动》系列的关注，转而考虑其他作家处理同样或类似的问题(例如，Sithole关注的是RRR Dhlomo的作品)。特刊本身是由AWMellon资助的“反思南非文学”项目构思和支持的，该项目设在UWC的CMDR。这是一个合作的、多语言的、跨学科的项目，旨在重新思考我们概念化和理解南非文学领域的方式，在种族隔离立法结束近三十年后，
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901411
M. Chapman
The article considers the scope and purpose of the project, “Translating (South) African Literatures”, in relation to the early twentieth-century Xhosa writer, SEK Mqhayi, two of whose works have been translated into English in the project. Turning to the several prompts to reflection offered by the project, I evaluate Mqhayi's contribution to an ‘expanded' South African literary history. As does the project, my argument requires a return to the archive, in this case of Mqhayi's dual commitment to both Xhosa custom (‘Red') and colonial-Christian modernisation (‘School'). A brief comparison of Mqhayi's plain voice of ethical justice and, in the mid-1920s, the experimental modernism of his contemporary, William Plomer, raises the issue of an appropriate aesthetic in an expanded literary history, while I conclude with a key consideration in any translation project: the need for a ‘usable’ theory and practice of translation.
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901414
C. Dunton
This article examines SM Mofokeng’s play Senkatana as a version of the legend of Kgodumodumo and Senkatana, earlier versions of which are summarised to provide comparative contextualisation and to clarify Mofokeng’s thematic priorities in constructing his text. The discussion of the play focuses on its dependence on oratory, but more especially on the way it projects parallels between Senkatana’s life and death and those of Christ, and on the contemporary relevance of the play. Throughout, parallels are drawn between Senkatana and other texts in the Africa Pulse series of translations of southern African classics; there is, too, some comment on the processes of literary translation.
{"title":"A Vital Question for Contemporary South Africans: SM Mofokeng’s Senkatana","authors":"C. Dunton","doi":"10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901414","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901414","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines SM Mofokeng’s play Senkatana as a version of the legend of Kgodumodumo and Senkatana, earlier versions of which are summarised to provide comparative contextualisation and to clarify Mofokeng’s thematic priorities in constructing his text. The discussion of the play focuses on its dependence on oratory, but more especially on the way it projects parallels between Senkatana’s life and death and those of Christ, and on the contemporary relevance of the play. Throughout, parallels are drawn between Senkatana and other texts in the Africa Pulse series of translations of southern African classics; there is, too, some comment on the processes of literary translation.","PeriodicalId":52015,"journal":{"name":"Current Writing-Text and Reception in Southern Africa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901414","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46448169","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902074
Ashraf Jamal
This analysis of black South African fiction, translated into English, pivots on a century-old aberration, the Natives Land Act of 1913, which assigned 90% of the land to a white minority. The fallout of this destructive legislation remains with us today. Indeed, landlessness, I argue, is the fundamental root of South Africa’s continued ills. Whether conceived under colonialism, apartheid, or the post-apartheid moment – our phantom democracy – the fiction gathered under the moniker, Africa Pulse, is fundamentally concerned with a relation to land, or a divorce from it. A complex of problems – economic, political, cultural and psychological – emerge. Two novels span the century-old conflict, BW Vilakazi’s No Matter When and MJ Mngadi’s Home is Nowhere. The first is a romantic, egalitarian, and inclusive vision, the latter starkly and brutally dystopian. As bookends, they mark an unrequited desire for a sense of home, and the pathological consequence of its obliteration.
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929x.2021.1901410
Michael Chapman
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902082
A. Gagiano
{"title":"The Reluctant Storyteller: A Collection of Short Stories","authors":"A. Gagiano","doi":"10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902082","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902082","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":52015,"journal":{"name":"Current Writing-Text and Reception in Southern Africa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902082","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45491221","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1902063
Peter D. McDonald
The new English translation of SEK Mqhayi's Ityala Lamawele (1914), The Lawsuit of the Twins (2018), is a major cultural event. Seen against the background of Ityala Lamawele's long and complex history as a published work, however, the new translation raises several important questions for readers today. Above all, by bringing the tensions between the intermediaries who shape the space of the literary and the creative practice of writers sharply into focus, it obliges readers to ask who conceptualises the literary, by what means, and to what effect? The article concludes by considering how the new translation creates opportunities for rethinking Anglograph literary and African studies in productive ways.
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929x.2021.1902075
The last 30 years, or so, signal a distinct period in southern Africa (after institutionalised apartheid) and, in 1989, globally (the fall of the Berlin Wall). If the starting date has a ‘neatness’, the 30-year period has rendered contentious phrases such as “the end of history” and (in South Africa) “the rainbow nation”. What of literature and its accompanying interpretation from 1990 to the present day? As we look back, how might we go forward? To quote Weimann, how do we relate past significance to current meaning? The title and subtitle of the journal, Current Writing: Text and Reception in Southern Africa, play deliberately on an openness of ambiguity. “Current” can refer to texts from the 30-year period or older texts that are re-interpreted from a current perspective. “Writing” suggests that works are not confined to any canonical definition of Literature. “Texts” can originate in southern Africa, or elsewhere, while “reception” in either case should seek comparative connections with ‘South’ concerns. Energy has been expended in segmenting the last 30 years into phases of anti-apartheid, postapartheid, the TRC, the Zuma presidency, ‘after Mugabe’, and so on. While such delineations can lend contextual precision to works, submissions must retain a literary focus. The single theme of both issues, “The Last Thirty Years” – it is hoped – will provoke ‘currency’ in text selection, interpretation, and debate.
{"title":"Call for Papers","authors":"","doi":"10.1080/1013929x.2021.1902075","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929x.2021.1902075","url":null,"abstract":"The last 30 years, or so, signal a distinct period in southern Africa (after institutionalised apartheid) and, in 1989, globally (the fall of the Berlin Wall). If the starting date has a ‘neatness’, the 30-year period has rendered contentious phrases such as “the end of history” and (in South Africa) “the rainbow nation”. What of literature and its accompanying interpretation from 1990 to the present day? As we look back, how might we go forward? To quote Weimann, how do we relate past significance to current meaning? The title and subtitle of the journal, Current Writing: Text and Reception in Southern Africa, play deliberately on an openness of ambiguity. “Current” can refer to texts from the 30-year period or older texts that are re-interpreted from a current perspective. “Writing” suggests that works are not confined to any canonical definition of Literature. “Texts” can originate in southern Africa, or elsewhere, while “reception” in either case should seek comparative connections with ‘South’ concerns. Energy has been expended in segmenting the last 30 years into phases of anti-apartheid, postapartheid, the TRC, the Zuma presidency, ‘after Mugabe’, and so on. While such delineations can lend contextual precision to works, submissions must retain a literary focus. The single theme of both issues, “The Last Thirty Years” – it is hoped – will provoke ‘currency’ in text selection, interpretation, and debate.","PeriodicalId":52015,"journal":{"name":"Current Writing-Text and Reception in Southern Africa","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2021-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/1013929x.2021.1902075","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45416373","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2021.1901417
Antjie Krog
This essay looks at a recently translated poem, “Ntwa ea Jeremane 1914”, written by BM Khaketla, as a lens through which to approach the feelings and attitudes of people from Lesotho towards the world wars. A poem is sometimes described as a gathering of spoken or written words, arranged in such a way that it evokes an intense imaginative alertness around an issue, an emotion or an experience. Investigations into the participation of black South Africans in the world wars mainly rest on official archival documentation, with attention focused on the racial, socio-economic context and the post-war treatment of soldiers. Distinction is seldom made between black South Africans and those from Lesotho (or Swaziland or Botswana) as they were all drafted under the South African contingents. There has been little discussion in South African art about why black people joined the Allied forces during the world wars, with the prominence of the sinking of the SS Mendi a wonderful exception as it reverberates in SEK Mqhayi's famous poem, “Ukutshona kuka Mendi”, as well as Fred Khumalo's recent novel, Dancing the Death Drill (2017). The visual artist William Kentridge has also commemorated the death of very large numbers of black Africans in the First World War in his powerful exhibition, The Head and the Load. This article explores the expression of emotions and conclusions about the world wars in a poem by Khaketla, as well as the techniques he uses to carry these across larger vistas.
本文以BM Khaketla最近翻译的一首诗《1914年的Ntwa ea Jeremane》为例，通过这首诗来了解莱索托人民对世界大战的感受和态度。一首诗有时被描述为口头或书面文字的集合，以这样一种方式排列，它唤起了对一个问题、一种情感或一种经历的强烈的想象力警觉。对南非黑人参加世界大战的调查主要依靠官方档案文件，重点是种族、社会经济背景和战后对士兵的待遇。南非黑人和来自莱索托(或斯威士兰或博茨瓦纳)的黑人之间很少有区别，因为他们都是在南非特遣队的麾下征召的。南非艺术界很少讨论为什么黑人在世界大战期间加入了盟军，但SS Mendi号的沉没是一个很好的例外，因为它在SEK Mqhayi的著名诗歌《Ukutshona kuka Mendi》以及弗雷德·库马洛(Fred Khumalo)最近的小说《跳舞的死亡演习》(2017)中都有回响。视觉艺术家威廉·肯特里奇(William Kentridge)也在他的强大展览《头与负荷》(The Head and The Load)中纪念了大量在第一次世界大战中丧生的非洲黑人。本文探讨了Khaketla在一首诗中对世界大战的情感和结论的表达，以及他在更大的远景中运用的技巧。
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