LITERATURE - The African Mirror

Mar

11

2025

The incredible journey of two princes from Mozambique whose lives were upended by the slave trade

LITERATURE

A new book called The Two Princes of Mpfumo tells the fascinating story of a pair of royals from Mozambique in southern Africa whose lives were thrown into chaos by the transatlantic slave trade. We asked historian Lindsay O'Neill three questions about her book. What is the story of the princes? Prince James and Prince John came from Mpfumo, one kingdom among many that dotted the shores of modern-day Maputo Bay, where the capital of Mozambique now stands. Here, in the 1700s, no Europeans held sway. African kingdoms did, and those kingdoms fought constantly. Mpfumo had once been a power…

Mar

01

2025

By TINASHE MUSHAKAVANHU

Africa’s newest book prize is named after Andreé Blouin: who was she?

LITERATURE

ANDRÉE Blouin was a political activist and writer from the Central African Republic. Until recently, her name hardly ever appeared in the grand narratives of Africa’s liberation. When she died in 1986, her passing was hardly in the news – a stark contrast to her pivotal role as an adviser and campaign strategist to newly independent African leaders in Algeria, both Congos, Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Guinea and Ghana. She was more than a participant. She was an organising force, an architect of resistance, and a strategist who shaped the fight against colonial rule. Yet, like many women in African history,…

Feb

14

2025

By GWEN ANSELL

Michael Mosoeu Moerane was a pioneering composer in South Africa. A new book is restoring his place in history

LITERATURE

COMPOSER and educator Michael Mosoeu Moerane (1904-1980) is probably best known for a few evergreen choral works, including Della and Sylvia, still sung by choirs across South Africa today. And, of course, for his orchestral piece FatŠe laHeso (My Country). It had the distinction of being recorded by both the British and South African public broadcasters in an era when white minority rule denied even the existence of Black classical musicians. Apartheid held the identity of Black people in South Africa to be unchangingly simple, rural and tribal. Sophisticated activities such as orchestral composing were both beyond their capacity and…

Feb

06

2025

By LIEZILLE JACOBS

Psychology in democratic South Africa: new book explores a post-apartheid journey

LITERATURE

WHEN apartheid ended in 1994, South Africa underwent significant social and political transformation. A key aspect of this shift was the push for greater inclusion and representation of Black South Africans across all sectors – including psychology. Dr Liezille Jacobs was part of a pioneering generation of Black psychologists who started their training in 1995. Now she has written a book, Rocklands: On Becoming the first generation of Black psychologists in post-apartheid South Africa. In it she explores the barriers she and her colleagues faced and unpacks misconceptions around what psychology is and does. She also argues that critical (and…

Jan

21

2025

By OLIVIER MOREILLON

K Sello Duiker, a rock star of South African literature, died 20 years ago. How his work lives on

LITERATURE

K. SELLO DUIKER was regarded as a “rock star” of South African literature. He was one of a group of budding black South African novelists of the late 1990s and early 2000s who emerged with democracy in 1994. They stirred up the country’s literary scene with their irreverent take on post-apartheid socio-economic and cultural realities. On 19 January 2005, Duiker committed suicide at the age of 30. He had suffered from bipolar affective disorder. Olivier Moreillon is a scholar of post-apartheid South African literature who has researched Duiker. We asked him about the author’s legacy on the 20th anniversary of…

Jan

07

2025

By JESSICA FALCONI

Mozambique’s long struggle to build a nation – four novels that tell the story

LITERATURE

MOZAMBIQUE’S long history of nation-building is still unfinished. The country is still pursuing a cohesive national identity, stable institutions, and economic foundations that would unify diverse groups. This is crucial to foster harmony and political stability. Nation-building in Mozambique dates back to the last decades of Portuguese colonial rule, in the 1960s. At this time, it was mainly driven by resistance movements and anti-colonial struggles. As nationalist groups emerged, they aimed to unify diverse ethnic groups and overthrow colonial powers. A sense of shared identity was fostered through the fight for independence. But after independence in 1975, new challenges to…

Dec

22

2024

By GIBSON NCUBE; BIBI BURGER, CARL DEATH; DEIRDRE C. BYRNE; NEDINE MOONSAMY and PETER J. MAURITS

6 best African sci-fi and fantasy books to read this holiday

LITERATURE

SCIENCE fiction, fantasy, horror and other forms of speculative fiction are breathing new life into African writing. International awards, TV deals, new publishing imprints, a growing fanbase and academic studies are adding to the interest. So what are the best sci-fi and fantasy novels, short stories and anthologies to add to your wishlist? We asked six scholars who specialise in African sci-fi and fantasy to pick. Avenues by Train by Farai Mudzingwa Gibson Ncube Reading Zimbabwean writer Farai Mudzingwa’s Avenues by Train (2023), one cannot help but think of those moments when we find ourselves suspended between stations, neither here…

Nov

29

2024

By ROGER SOUTHALL

Jan Smuts was a white supremacist. Nelson Mandela a black liberation hero. New book explores what they have in common

LITERATURE

JAN Christiaan Smuts (1870-1950) and Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (1918-2013) belonged to and were shaped by two different epochs in South Africa, yet left an indelible mark on its history. Sociologist Roger Southall has brought them together, so to speak, in a book, Smuts & Mandela, The Men Who Made South Africa. Among the many parallels he draws between the two men – one a racist white supremacist and the other a non-racialist and African nationalist – is that they were both nation-builders. Smuts made the state which Mandela fought to transform. We asked the author to explain. What do you…

Nov

15

2024

By JOSÉ LINGNA NAFAFÉ

Angolan prince started campaign to end Atlantic slave trade long before Europeans did – new book

LITERATURE

FOR centuries, it has been held that the ideas and movement for the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade came from Western abolitionists. No input from Africans has been acknowledged. As a professor of African and Atlantic history, I challenge this notion in a book titled Lourenço da Silva Mendonça and the Black Atlantic Abolitionist Movement in the Seventeenth Century. The book is based on new material found in Portuguese, Spanish and Vatican archives. Its key argument is that the ideas and movement for ending transatlantic slavery began largely among Africans in the Portuguese empire in the 17th century. And…

Nov

13

2024

By OLIVIER MOREILLON

A South African politician ends up homeless in Nthikeng Mohlele’s spicy new novel – but is it any good?

LITERATURE

DESPITE the flaws in the latest novel by South African writer Nthikeng Mohlele, there is something alluring about Revolutionaries’ House. It is Mohlele’s most political novel, and the parallels drawn between love and politics – and their pitfalls – are intriguing. Revolutionaries’ House is timely. It advocates the desperate need for South Africa’s political elite to take a step back and evaluate its own deficiencies before thinking of a possible path into a better future. Too little has changed for too few since democracy in 1994. It’s Mohlele’s eighth novel and follows the narrator Mr Winston, “a politician first and…