When people worldwide think about famous poets, they think about William Shakespeare from Britain, Wolfgang von Goethe from Germany or Victor Hugo from France. But Africa also has some great minds, and they do not always get the attention they deserve. This is particularly the case with South African poets. That does not mean that famous European poets are overrated. Germany is particularly well known for its poets like Rainer Maria Rilke or the Grimm brothers. Germany is also known for various famous inventions like the Merkur slot or the Diesel engine as well as the Röntgen X-ray machine.
But there are also quite a few similarities between South Africa and Germany, and poetry is certainly one of them. Like German poets, South African poets are also a part of the country’s heritage. At the same time, they represent South African heritage. Some of them are rather famous, even world famous like J.R.R. Tolkien. Others are well known within the borders of the most southern African country but not so much in the rest of the world. In this article, we would like to highlight the nine most famous South African poets. Who are they, and what are they known for particularly?
Looking back at the History of Poetry in South Africa
South Africa is a unique country, and its history is diverse. Looking back at South Africa as a country, we can find dark episodes of colonization, the unimaginable times of Apartheid and lastly, becoming a democratic and open society and country. This historical diversity is something we can not only find in the poetry of South African poets; no, that is exactly what the country’s poets are all about.
When a country goes through times of change, so do its artists, and those changes are reflected in their work. South Africa has a rich and diverse literary history, which comes particularly to light when we look at the language diversity of its artists. Black South African artists emerged around the 20th century because that was when the work of black artists began to be published throughout the country.
Around the years from 1890 to the early 1900s, more and more South African Poems in Afrikaans began to emerge. The Afrikaans literature particularly dominated South African Poets during the dark times of the Apartheid regime. In the late 1970s, what has been called protest poets began to show up. During the post-Apartheid years, the South African art scene shifted its focus toward national identity and nation-building.
Let’s take a look at the nine most famous poets of this rightfully proud nation, including a few of the most South African female poets, of course:
Samuel Edward Krune Mqhayi (1875-1945) – The Poet Laureate of the African People
Samuel Edward Krune Mqhayi is widely considered responsible for conserving the isiXhosa language. He was born on December 1st 1875 in Gqumahashe, a mission station in South Africa’s eastern province of Alice. Sadly, Mqhayi never met his mother, as she died when he was only two years old. When he was nine, his father moved to Centane, where he stayed for six years.
During those six years, he came into close contact with Xhosa life. Mqhayi attended Lovedale College, where he studied hard to become a teacher. 1897 was the year when he gained attention and maybe laid the foundation for becoming one of the very famous African poets. He published a poem in his newspaper, which he founded with a few others, highlighting his discomfort with South Africa becoming a “Westernized” country. His most famous poems were “Lawsuit of the Twins” and “Utopia.”
It was no other than Nelson Mandela who gave him his title. The two met twice before Mqhayi’s death. Maybe that has something to do with Mqhayi adding seven stanzas to Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika. This song became the national anthem of no less than three African countries, including his home country.
Uys Krige (1910-1987) – The Сritic of White Supremacy
When looking for the most famous poets in South Africa, the name Uys Krige has to be mentioned. Mattheus Uys Krige was born on February 4, 1910 in Bontebokskloof, Cape Province. He is widely considered an exception of South African poets of his time. That is because Krige was openly hostile to the nationalism, racism, and white supremacy of white South Africans.
Looking back at his family, it isn’t surprising that Krige became a very successful artist. His mother was a writer, and his younger brother was a painter. Krige became an incredible language talent as he lived in France and Spain during his early adulthood, where he became fluent in both French and Spanish. During WWII, he was captured as a prisoner of war in a POW camp in Italy, where he also acquired fluent Italian.
He became famous with his “Lied van die fascistic bomwerpers” where he criticized Apartheid rule as well as the catholic church. Krige was also famous for his translation skills of poetry into Afrikaans.
David Wright (1920-1994) – The “English” South African Poet
David John Murray Wright was one of the most remarkable South African poets. His birthplace was Johannesburg, where he was born on February 20, 1920. He was a normal child until he was seven years old. Wright suffered from Scarlett fever and ended up being deaf for the rest of his life. Wright moved to England at 14 and started his education at the Northampton School for the Deaf.
Later on, he became an Oriel College, Oxford graduate in 1942. His passion was not only poetry, but he also started a career as a writer for the Sunday Times, thus becoming one of the most famous South African writers. His very first poem, Eton Hall already been published in Oxford Poetry, but his passion for writing never left him, which can be seen in Deafness: A Personal Account.
Wright’s poetry work has been regularly published in various magazines, newspapers and other press organs. Wright was one of the few famous South African Authors whose poems were made public in England from 1947 to 1992.
Ingrid Jonker (1933-1965) – The Poet Who Left Far Too Early
There is very little doubt that Ingrid Jonker is still one of those few famous poets in South Africa who are still remembered in such a special way. Ingrid was born on 19 September 1933 in Douglas, Northern Cape. Jonker started writing poems very early in her life. She sent her first collection of self-written poems to a local newspaper at 16.
She always made it clear that writing was her real passion in life. Jonker published a book of her poems for the first time in 1956. Ironically, though, not in South Africa, as everyone there turned her down. No, her first book was printed in The Netherlands. Seven years later, Jonker published a second series of poems.
Ingrid Jonker has also been a protégé of Uys Krige, who had a large influence on Jonker becoming a critic of the National Party and the Apartheid regime. Sadly, Jonker passed away way too early, at the age of 31, by suicide. On July 19th 1965, Ingrid Jonker went to the beach of Three Anchor Bay in Cape Town and drowned herself in the water.
One of the pieces she wrote that brought her to the most elite of South African famous poets was:
Bitterbessie Dagbreek (“Bitterberry Daybreak”)
Bitter-berry daybreak
bitter-berry sun
a mirror has broken
between me and him
I try to find the highway
perhaps to run away
but everywhere the footpaths
of his words lead me astray
Pinewood remember
pinewood forget
however much I lose my way
I step on my regret
Parrot-coloured echo
tricks me tricks me on
until I turn beguiled
to retrieve the mocking song
Echo gives no answer
he answers everyone
bitter-berry daybreak
bitter-berry sun
Translated from Afrikaans by Antjie Kroog and André Brink
J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) – The father of the Lord of the Rings
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien is known nowadays by pretty much everyone. He is not only one of the most well-known South African poets but also one of the most well-known in the world. What makes this a bit strange is that Tolkien was indeed born in Bloemfontein in the Orange Free State of South Africa, but he has always been a British national. When Tolkien was three, his mother left him and his brother to visit their family in England with his father shortly to join. Unfortunately, Tolkien’s father died of rheumatic fever, and thus the family never went back to South Africa.
Tolkien grew up in England and graduated from Exeter College in 1915. He then entered the British Army, where he served until 1920. In 1937, he wrote The Hobbit, followed by The Lord of the Rings between 1937 and 1949. Today, it is one of the most sold books worldwide, selling over 100 million copies! The first part was published in July 1954, the second in November 1954, and the third in October 1955.
He is also among the most decorated British artists, having received the title of Commander of the Order of the British Empire by none other than Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth II in 1972.
Antjie Krog (1952 -)
With Antjie Krog, we have one of the South African poets and their poems of modern times. Krog was born in 1952 in Kronstadt, Orange Free State, into an Afrikaner family of writing artists. She was raised on a farm as the daughter of writer Dot Serfonstein.
As of early, Krog was opposed to the Apartheid regime, and that is how her writing career began. It was in 1970 that she wrote her anti-regime poem My Mooi Land (My Beautiful Country). That was during a time when John Vorster’s regime was in power. With this poem, she became famous overnight, but she didn’t stop there. She published another series of poems titled “Dogter van Jefta” (Daughter of Jephta) shortly after when she was only 17. She remained a loud critic of the regime and took part in anti-Apartheid activities throughout her adult life.
Krog became a famous journalist and was part of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission team of South Africa. She reported two years at the commission using her maiden name, Antjie Samuel. What she learned at that time became later based on her book “Country of My Skull.” This book brought Krog world fame as it was turned into a Hollywood film starring none other than Samuel L. Jackson.
Her journalistic career started much earlier, however. 1993 she joined the current affairs journal “Die Suid-Afrikaan” (The South African). One of the founders of the journal was Hermann Giliomee. Antje Krog continued her journalistic career after working for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. From 1995 to 2000, she joined the South African Broadcasting Corporation as a radio journalist.
Breyten Breytenbach (1939 -)
For some, Breyten Breytenbach is more than just another one of the famous South African Poets. Born on September 16th 1939 in Bonnievale, Cape Province, he became a well-known poet and writer, but sadly, not only because of his artwork. His brother Jan Breytenbach was one of the founders of the 1st Reconnaissance Commando of the South African Special Forces, and politically, the two brothers were miles apart.
Breytenbach was forced to leave South Africa and seek refuge in Paris, France. After marrying a French woman of Vietnamese heritage, he couldn’t return to his home country due to race laws. Nevertheless, Breytenbach illegally went back to South Africa and promptly was arrested for treason and sentenced to nine years in prison. During those years in prison, he wrote his “Ballade van ontroue bemindes” (Ballade of Unfaithful Lovers), which became one of the most famous African poems of all time.
Another very well-known poem by Breytenbach is:
In a Burning Sea
how often were we wrapped in coolness on the floor
the smell of turpentine and fire
the canvases white to our empty eyes
night’s indifference
and the moon a smile somewhere outside
out of sight
days decompose like seasons beyond the panes
leaves of rain, a face, a cloud, this poem
I wanted to leave my imprint on you
to brand you with the flaming hour
of being alone
no fire sings as clear
as the silver ashes of your movements
and your melancholy body
I wanted to draw that sadness from you
so that you might be revealed
the way a city opens
on a bright landscape
filled with pigeons and the fire of trees
and silver crows also out of sight in the night
and the moon a mouth that one can ignite
and then I wished that you could laugh
and your body bitter
my hands of porcelain on your hips
your breath such a dark-dark pain
a sword at my ear
how often were we here
where only silver shadows stir
only through you I had to deny myself
through you alone I knew I had no harbor
in a burning sea
Keorapetse William Kgositsile (1938-2018)
Kgositsile had a very unusual childhood as he was born in a predominantly white Johannesburg neighbourhood. He felt what Apartheid meant pretty soon, however, as he had been excluded from many activities for kids his age. He first appeared on the regime’s radar when he started working for the political newspaper “New Age.”
In 1961, he fled the country first to Dar-es-Salaam and then to the United States. In the U.S., he entered a Master’s program at Columbia University and won two poetry awards. In 1975 he went back to Dar-es-Salaam. Kgositsile died in 2018 in his home country, South Africa, even in his hometown, Johannesburg.
Mzwakhe Mbuli (1959 -)
Among the list of famous South African poets is another famous black artist. Zwakhe Mbuli was born in Sophiatown, but the regime forced him and his family to move to Soweto as bulldozers destroyed their home. He felt the full authoritarian force of the regime in the 1980s when he was imprisoned multiple times. Furthermore, he has been denied a passport to leave South Africa. Finally, his career started to take off in the 1990s in Berlin, Germany. Mbuli shared the stage with none other than Youssou N’dour. The highlight of his career was, however, without a doubt, his performance at Nelson Mandela’s presidential inauguration.
Today, South Africa Is a Changed Country and so Are its Artists
The years of oppression are long gone, but the wounds are still visible in South Africa. The poets and other artists who are still alive serve as a reminder of those dark times. Modern South Africa is a different country, however. A country that led Africa to the host of the first World Cup on African soil. The future has probably never been brighter for young South African artists!