Panel on Contemporary South African Poetry

Extract

The only was I can describe black South African writing is to say it’s a very tragic thing in its own way because of what is happening in South Africa. The writing seems to have no continuity; usually when we talk about black South African writing, we start around the sixties, but I think it started long before then. We have people writing in Setswana, Sevenda, Shangaan, Xhosa, and many other indigenous languages, and I’m sure that up to now we still aren’t fully aware of the wealth of literature written in those languages.

When I started writing, it was as if there had never been writers before in my country. By the time I learned to write, many people—Zeke, Kgositsile, Mazisi Kunene, Dennis Brutus—had left the country and were living in exile.