It's my hand that wrote!
- Authors: Magade, Mncedi
- Date: 2020
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142551 , vital:38090
- Description: This collection of short stories experiments with the idea of the text as it constitutes the world just as much as it is constituted by the world. These short stories use the text as a way to respond to struggles faced by people whose identities do not conform to society’s standards. The stories in here navigate between fantastic and experiential writing which allows the text to speak in its own language. The writing is influenced by that of Mthuthuzeli Matshoba for the realist approach in telling the stories. Ayi Kwei Armah’s writing in Fragments for experientialism that focuses on the dead and the living and which makes specific references to the idea of home – particularly for those who always find it hard to belong. And that of Bruce Sterling’s creation of explosive imagery in science fiction that sticks in the reader’s mind as portrayed in his short story we see things differently. Angela Carter’s brilliance in writing short stories and her approach to magical realism has also been a powerful influence. In telling these stories using a hybrid/fluid approach, I hope to come to terms with being a different “being”. It is to find ways of telling myself that it is okay to be queer, that to be a misfit is no sin. To say this in a language that gives meaning to my own struggles of being. This work is a combination of three disjointed moments of the narrator’s life experiences which are exposed in three sections; It’s My Hand That Wrote, (Un)Tying The Knot and Thoughts. The aim of creating these three moments is to let the reader dive a variety of “truths” of the narrator’s life, instead of aiming to achieve a coherent single “Truth” about one’s life. It’s My Hand That Wrote explores both the unusual and inconsistency of life in a chaotic but explorative fashion.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2020
- Authors: Magade, Mncedi
- Date: 2020
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142551 , vital:38090
- Description: This collection of short stories experiments with the idea of the text as it constitutes the world just as much as it is constituted by the world. These short stories use the text as a way to respond to struggles faced by people whose identities do not conform to society’s standards. The stories in here navigate between fantastic and experiential writing which allows the text to speak in its own language. The writing is influenced by that of Mthuthuzeli Matshoba for the realist approach in telling the stories. Ayi Kwei Armah’s writing in Fragments for experientialism that focuses on the dead and the living and which makes specific references to the idea of home – particularly for those who always find it hard to belong. And that of Bruce Sterling’s creation of explosive imagery in science fiction that sticks in the reader’s mind as portrayed in his short story we see things differently. Angela Carter’s brilliance in writing short stories and her approach to magical realism has also been a powerful influence. In telling these stories using a hybrid/fluid approach, I hope to come to terms with being a different “being”. It is to find ways of telling myself that it is okay to be queer, that to be a misfit is no sin. To say this in a language that gives meaning to my own struggles of being. This work is a combination of three disjointed moments of the narrator’s life experiences which are exposed in three sections; It’s My Hand That Wrote, (Un)Tying The Knot and Thoughts. The aim of creating these three moments is to let the reader dive a variety of “truths” of the narrator’s life, instead of aiming to achieve a coherent single “Truth” about one’s life. It’s My Hand That Wrote explores both the unusual and inconsistency of life in a chaotic but explorative fashion.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2020
Red and other short stories
- Authors: Harrison, Francis J
- Date: 2020
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141583 , vital:37987
- Description: Part A: Thesis (Creative Work);Part B: Portfolio. Final submission for the degree of Master of Arts in Creative Writing (MACW).
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- Date Issued: 2020
- Authors: Harrison, Francis J
- Date: 2020
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141583 , vital:37987
- Description: Part A: Thesis (Creative Work);Part B: Portfolio. Final submission for the degree of Master of Arts in Creative Writing (MACW).
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- Date Issued: 2020
Memory of a dead river
- Authors: Mayo, Thandokazi
- Date: 2019
- Subjects: Short stories, South African (English) , South African (English)
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/92364 , vital:30716
- Description: My thesis is a collection of short stories that tap into cultural, literal references, both oral andvisual, and also draws on images I have seen and have struggled to get out of my head. The collection draws on Alissa Nutting’s distorted realism and Noy Holland’s evocative imagery to make even the most mundane things feel like something out of the ordinary. An unreal way of looking at real things. The stories are interrelated only insofar as they seek to normalise or neutralise the peculiarity of society’s seemingly outdated people who come from the rural areas. Their faces, their stories, their general mannerisms. To capture the tone of their emotions, their small plights, and to give an in-depth look into how where you are affects the very shape of your face.
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- Date Issued: 2019
- Authors: Mayo, Thandokazi
- Date: 2019
- Subjects: Short stories, South African (English) , South African (English)
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/92364 , vital:30716
- Description: My thesis is a collection of short stories that tap into cultural, literal references, both oral andvisual, and also draws on images I have seen and have struggled to get out of my head. The collection draws on Alissa Nutting’s distorted realism and Noy Holland’s evocative imagery to make even the most mundane things feel like something out of the ordinary. An unreal way of looking at real things. The stories are interrelated only insofar as they seek to normalise or neutralise the peculiarity of society’s seemingly outdated people who come from the rural areas. Their faces, their stories, their general mannerisms. To capture the tone of their emotions, their small plights, and to give an in-depth look into how where you are affects the very shape of your face.
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- Date Issued: 2019
Therefore I am
- Authors: Núñez-Lagos, Andres
- Date: 2019
- Subjects: South African fiction (English)
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/92737 , vital:30743
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2019
- Authors: Núñez-Lagos, Andres
- Date: 2019
- Subjects: South African fiction (English)
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/92737 , vital:30743
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- Date Issued: 2019
Beasts we love
- Authors: Masolane, Tseliso Chrisjan
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Detective and mystery stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63098 , vital:28363
- Description: My thesis is a novella in flash, written as political crime fiction. It is set in contemporary South Africa and tells the story of Rafau Lekopo, a teacher from a little township called Dikgohlong, whose life is changed forever after he finds his wife and the mayor in bed and shoots them both dead. The information contained within the dead mayor's notebook proves to be explosive, showing that the mayor is far more than he seems, and that he is in fact in the employ of a foreign intelligence service. After his release from prison, the embittered Lekopo sets about his revenge against powerful men who abuse their political power. He takes refuge in Lesotho, masterminds a series of heists, car-hijackings and human trafficking, and expands his syndication back in South Africa. Using the contacts and information from the mayor's notebook, he manipulates the Lesotho government into a diplomatic feud with South Africa which treatens to escalate into a military conflict.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Masolane, Tseliso Chrisjan
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Detective and mystery stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63098 , vital:28363
- Description: My thesis is a novella in flash, written as political crime fiction. It is set in contemporary South Africa and tells the story of Rafau Lekopo, a teacher from a little township called Dikgohlong, whose life is changed forever after he finds his wife and the mayor in bed and shoots them both dead. The information contained within the dead mayor's notebook proves to be explosive, showing that the mayor is far more than he seems, and that he is in fact in the employ of a foreign intelligence service. After his release from prison, the embittered Lekopo sets about his revenge against powerful men who abuse their political power. He takes refuge in Lesotho, masterminds a series of heists, car-hijackings and human trafficking, and expands his syndication back in South Africa. Using the contacts and information from the mayor's notebook, he manipulates the Lesotho government into a diplomatic feud with South Africa which treatens to escalate into a military conflict.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Between blue and light
- Authors: Campbell, Jennifer
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63570 , vital:28441
- Description: My novella follows a narrator observing her life, as she struggles with what it is to live in a world that she finds simultaneously frightening and beautiful. The story touches on the limitations of human connection and with loss in various forms. Set in both Cape Town and small town South Africa, the story explores the inner life of a woman detached and adrift.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Campbell, Jennifer
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63570 , vital:28441
- Description: My novella follows a narrator observing her life, as she struggles with what it is to live in a world that she finds simultaneously frightening and beautiful. The story touches on the limitations of human connection and with loss in various forms. Set in both Cape Town and small town South Africa, the story explores the inner life of a woman detached and adrift.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Blue ring of fire
- Authors: O’Flaherty, Craig
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63615 , vital:28448
- Description: My poems are reflections of shape, colour and emotions expressed through imagery. Their unsentimental landscape-realism echo my own feelings as well as broader human dimensions of contradiction and uncertainty, without trying to resolve them. In the same way that photography is the art of 'painting with light', my poems seek a language that evokes light and darkness. They aspire to what Keats said when writing about ‘negative capability’: “Poetical character has no self, it is anything and nothing, it has no character and enjoys light and shade”. My poems explore what I have learned about form – how line-length, syntax and musicality can add grace and energy to language. Poets that have influenced me include the classical Chinese poets such as Du Fu and Li Po, and the Generation of 27 Spanish poets, such as Antonio Machado and Leon Felipe.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: O’Flaherty, Craig
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63615 , vital:28448
- Description: My poems are reflections of shape, colour and emotions expressed through imagery. Their unsentimental landscape-realism echo my own feelings as well as broader human dimensions of contradiction and uncertainty, without trying to resolve them. In the same way that photography is the art of 'painting with light', my poems seek a language that evokes light and darkness. They aspire to what Keats said when writing about ‘negative capability’: “Poetical character has no self, it is anything and nothing, it has no character and enjoys light and shade”. My poems explore what I have learned about form – how line-length, syntax and musicality can add grace and energy to language. Poets that have influenced me include the classical Chinese poets such as Du Fu and Li Po, and the Generation of 27 Spanish poets, such as Antonio Machado and Leon Felipe.
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- Date Issued: 2018
I won’t be long
- Mhlambi, Ntombi Kayise Millicent
- Authors: Mhlambi, Ntombi Kayise Millicent
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63603 , vital:28446
- Description: My thesis is a weave of short stories, flash fiction and vignettes of prose-poetry. It uses lyrical, scenic and explorative modes to explore the stories of women, past, present and future, from all walks of life. These women, young and old, struggle to find their way within a ‘world’ characterised as Salithambo (the pink castle) whose structures and survival preys on their bodies. The stories explore the themes of girlhood and maturation, violence (specifically against women), animality, scatology, time, gender roles and expectations, and their rejection. I draw inspiration, stylistically, from Irenosen Okojie’s depiction of beauty and terror in the same sentence; Selah Saterstrom’s fragmented plot and directorial stroke; Taban Lo Liyong & Amos Tutuola’s avant-gardism and amplification of language; Adania Shibli’s sensorial and spare prose, Lyudmila Petrushevskaya, Lily Hoang & Carol Oates’ normalized magic spell, Athena Villaverde & Espido Freire’s imaginative overload of childhood; Shelley Jackson & Chevisa Woods’ construction of body parts as bearing texts or as texts themselves.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Mhlambi, Ntombi Kayise Millicent
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63603 , vital:28446
- Description: My thesis is a weave of short stories, flash fiction and vignettes of prose-poetry. It uses lyrical, scenic and explorative modes to explore the stories of women, past, present and future, from all walks of life. These women, young and old, struggle to find their way within a ‘world’ characterised as Salithambo (the pink castle) whose structures and survival preys on their bodies. The stories explore the themes of girlhood and maturation, violence (specifically against women), animality, scatology, time, gender roles and expectations, and their rejection. I draw inspiration, stylistically, from Irenosen Okojie’s depiction of beauty and terror in the same sentence; Selah Saterstrom’s fragmented plot and directorial stroke; Taban Lo Liyong & Amos Tutuola’s avant-gardism and amplification of language; Adania Shibli’s sensorial and spare prose, Lyudmila Petrushevskaya, Lily Hoang & Carol Oates’ normalized magic spell, Athena Villaverde & Espido Freire’s imaginative overload of childhood; Shelley Jackson & Chevisa Woods’ construction of body parts as bearing texts or as texts themselves.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Poem to be sung
- Authors: Ndyoko, Nomtha
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63592 , vital:28444
- Description: My collection of poems expresses the complexities that exist beneath the surface of my life – my tongue, our bleak country, the politics of having a dark skin, my ancestors who speak to me in unexplainable ways, and the speech of nature – the wind, the sea, death, birds. It is in writing poems and songs that I make a space to be alive, a space to meet my ancestors and to say the unsayable. The poems move between the ordinary, the magical, the abject, and the spiritual, often expressing the contradictions that exist within life. The main influence on my poetry has come from music, from African jazz musicians such as Zim Ngqawana, Thandiswa Mazwai and Msaki Mvana. Literary influences have come from Spanish poets such as Juan Ramón Jiménez, whose strong imagery and short lines capture profound emotion, and from ancient Chinese poetry that moves in a fluid and minimal way. I have also been inspired by the African spirituality expressed in Mazisi Kunene’s poetry and the down-to-earth associative poetry of Mangaliso Buzani and Mxolisi Nyezwa.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Ndyoko, Nomtha
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa , South African poetry (English) -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63592 , vital:28444
- Description: My collection of poems expresses the complexities that exist beneath the surface of my life – my tongue, our bleak country, the politics of having a dark skin, my ancestors who speak to me in unexplainable ways, and the speech of nature – the wind, the sea, death, birds. It is in writing poems and songs that I make a space to be alive, a space to meet my ancestors and to say the unsayable. The poems move between the ordinary, the magical, the abject, and the spiritual, often expressing the contradictions that exist within life. The main influence on my poetry has come from music, from African jazz musicians such as Zim Ngqawana, Thandiswa Mazwai and Msaki Mvana. Literary influences have come from Spanish poets such as Juan Ramón Jiménez, whose strong imagery and short lines capture profound emotion, and from ancient Chinese poetry that moves in a fluid and minimal way. I have also been inspired by the African spirituality expressed in Mazisi Kunene’s poetry and the down-to-earth associative poetry of Mangaliso Buzani and Mxolisi Nyezwa.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Slanting the light
- Authors: Marais, Shirley
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African poetry (English) -- 21st century , Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63558 , vital:28440
- Description: Through my poetry I attempt to make sense of my encounters with myself by bringing to creative expression my experiences of and felt responses to people, places and situations. Among the poets who have had a significant influence on my work are Robert Berold, for his quiet assertion of intense, dramatic images; Frank O’Hara for his disciplined sense of mischief; Joan Metelerkamp for her meticulous attention to form and the way she makes a poem breathe; Robert Creeley for his ability to create free-floating meaning; and Mangaliso Buzani, for his fierce, honest poetics.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Marais, Shirley
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African poetry (English) -- 21st century , Creative writing (Higher education) -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63558 , vital:28440
- Description: Through my poetry I attempt to make sense of my encounters with myself by bringing to creative expression my experiences of and felt responses to people, places and situations. Among the poets who have had a significant influence on my work are Robert Berold, for his quiet assertion of intense, dramatic images; Frank O’Hara for his disciplined sense of mischief; Joan Metelerkamp for her meticulous attention to form and the way she makes a poem breathe; Robert Creeley for his ability to create free-floating meaning; and Mangaliso Buzani, for his fierce, honest poetics.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Witches & villains: the nasty tales
- Authors: Dalldorf, Tamaryn
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century , Fairy tales -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63087 , vital:28362
- Description: My thesis compromises a variety of short stories which are modern re-writes of dark fairy tales. Fairy Tales often explore the dark side of human nature and in these stories I focus on the voices of female villains and the strange psychology which drives them. I find Fairy Tales absorbing because they reveal the vulnerabilities, dreams and fears of the human consciousness. My stories contain some satirical expositions of human nature and society. My influences are the anthology of short stories, “My mother She Killed Me and My Father He Ate Me”, The Grimm Fairy Tales (original) and The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault as well as the writing of Horacio Moya, Angela Carter and Alissa Nutting for their dark satire and mockery of social eccentricities. Kate Bernheimer’s “Form is Fairy Tale and Fairy Tale is Form” is very influential in terms of the style it recommends in writing such as: “every day magic”, “flatness” (a form of narration), abstraction and intuitive logic.
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- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Dalldorf, Tamaryn
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: South African fiction (English) -- 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) -- 21st century , Fairy tales -- 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/63087 , vital:28362
- Description: My thesis compromises a variety of short stories which are modern re-writes of dark fairy tales. Fairy Tales often explore the dark side of human nature and in these stories I focus on the voices of female villains and the strange psychology which drives them. I find Fairy Tales absorbing because they reveal the vulnerabilities, dreams and fears of the human consciousness. My stories contain some satirical expositions of human nature and society. My influences are the anthology of short stories, “My mother She Killed Me and My Father He Ate Me”, The Grimm Fairy Tales (original) and The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault as well as the writing of Horacio Moya, Angela Carter and Alissa Nutting for their dark satire and mockery of social eccentricities. Kate Bernheimer’s “Form is Fairy Tale and Fairy Tale is Form” is very influential in terms of the style it recommends in writing such as: “every day magic”, “flatness” (a form of narration), abstraction and intuitive logic.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Back to nowhere
- Authors: Fundakubi, Zukile Anthony
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) 21st century , Xhosa fiction 21st century , Short stories, Xhosa 21st century , Detective and mystery stories 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5071 , vital:20763
- Description: My writing contains elements of hard-boiled detective fiction and crime writing. My stories, written in isiXhosa and English and a mixture of both, transplant these genres into a South African township setting where gang violence dominates and life is cheap. They are driven by uniquely South African characters, brutal crime scenes and fear-inspiring suspense, but none the less still full of humour. I want my work to entertain the reader while also looking realistically and critically at the problem of crime in our townships. I draw on influences of African and Latin American writers to create South African crime fiction in a realistic urban setting, with dynamic characters and sharp dialogue. , Le ngqokelela yamabali iqulathe amabali angobomi babantu abasezilokishini nabo bahlala ezilalini. Nangona umfundi angahle awafumanisa ehlekisa amanye elusizi, injongo yombhali asikukuhlekisa nakunyanzelisa imfundiso koko ikuzoba ubomi bababantu, bephila kwezi ndawo neengxaki abajongene nazo. Imeko yaba bantu kumakhaya ngamakhaya yiyo ebangele ukuba umbhali abelane nomfundi ngokuqhubekayo ebomini. , This thesis is presented in two parts: English and isiXhosa
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- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Fundakubi, Zukile Anthony
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) 21st century , Xhosa fiction 21st century , Short stories, Xhosa 21st century , Detective and mystery stories 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5071 , vital:20763
- Description: My writing contains elements of hard-boiled detective fiction and crime writing. My stories, written in isiXhosa and English and a mixture of both, transplant these genres into a South African township setting where gang violence dominates and life is cheap. They are driven by uniquely South African characters, brutal crime scenes and fear-inspiring suspense, but none the less still full of humour. I want my work to entertain the reader while also looking realistically and critically at the problem of crime in our townships. I draw on influences of African and Latin American writers to create South African crime fiction in a realistic urban setting, with dynamic characters and sharp dialogue. , Le ngqokelela yamabali iqulathe amabali angobomi babantu abasezilokishini nabo bahlala ezilalini. Nangona umfundi angahle awafumanisa ehlekisa amanye elusizi, injongo yombhali asikukuhlekisa nakunyanzelisa imfundiso koko ikuzoba ubomi bababantu, bephila kwezi ndawo neengxaki abajongene nazo. Imeko yaba bantu kumakhaya ngamakhaya yiyo ebangele ukuba umbhali abelane nomfundi ngokuqhubekayo ebomini. , This thesis is presented in two parts: English and isiXhosa
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- Date Issued: 2017
Bird-Monk Seding
- Authors: Rampolokeng, Lesego
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5049 , vital:20758
- Description: This novella is made up of interlinked stories from a rural township in the North West province. The stories of this surface-tranquil place are told through descriptive passages, vignettes, snatches of dialogue, profiles and picture-postcards, all organically interwoven and entwined, and rendered in non-linear fashion. They are set in shebeens, shops, farmlands and the dusty empty spaces of the South African landscape, peopled by police, tourists, and prostitutes of all sorts. The pervasiveness of violence in all forms has the fictional narrator reflecting on the violence of his own past. A smattering of musicians' musings gleaned from interviews and album liner-notes helps him navigate his way through this morass, the rage and frustration that simmers beneath it all.
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- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Rampolokeng, Lesego
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5049 , vital:20758
- Description: This novella is made up of interlinked stories from a rural township in the North West province. The stories of this surface-tranquil place are told through descriptive passages, vignettes, snatches of dialogue, profiles and picture-postcards, all organically interwoven and entwined, and rendered in non-linear fashion. They are set in shebeens, shops, farmlands and the dusty empty spaces of the South African landscape, peopled by police, tourists, and prostitutes of all sorts. The pervasiveness of violence in all forms has the fictional narrator reflecting on the violence of his own past. A smattering of musicians' musings gleaned from interviews and album liner-notes helps him navigate his way through this morass, the rage and frustration that simmers beneath it all.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Emathunjini omhlaba kuhlala abantu
- Authors: Moya, Mlandeli Wellington
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Short stories, Xhosa
- Language: Xhosa , English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7235 , vital:21231
- Description: My short stories are about the circumstances in which black gold miners in Welkom in the 1980s and 1990s found themselves. These mineworkers - I was one of them - made up a large, uneducated segment of personnel because our work required strength and good health only. We came from all over the African continent. The places we had to live in were like jails or military barracks, sometimes with twenty or more of us sharing a single room. Because of these conditions, we shared our pains, and the pains of wives, children and relatives of those who were killed or disabled by their work, the repatriation of those who lost their capacity to continue working because of accidents and work, and work-related illnesses. We did not share the same language, and so we had to learn Fanakalo, the language of South African mine workers. My stories show how pain and happiness rub shoulders with each other in the miners' life, because besides the dangerous work there was also cultural entertainment, religious practices, robbery by tsotsis, and many prostitutes. The book Buzani Kubawo by Witness K. Tamsanqa has been an important influence on my writing. Other influences have been L.L. Sebe's Ucamngco and P.T. Mtuze's Alitshoni Lingaphumi. , La mabali angeemeko zabembi-migodi baseWelkom phaya kwiminyaka ephakathi koo-1980 noo-1990. Aba basebenzi, endandingomnye wabo, babeliqela elivisayo elingafundanga — bezingca ngamandla. Sasiphuma mbombo zonke zeli lase-Afrika. Indawo esasihlala kuyo ibifana nqwa nezisele zentolongo okanye izindlu zasemkhosini. Amashumi amabini amadoda elala ndlwini - nye. Ngenxa yaloo meko sachubelana amabali ngeemeko zobomi bethu, ngabafazi nabantwana, nezizalwane, nangeengozi esasingena kuzo nokugoduswa kwabo bagulayo. Kwathi kuba sasithetha iilwimi ngeelwimi safundiswa isiFanakalo. Amabali am abonisa iintlungu ezayame kulonwabo kuloo meko yasemigodini kuba yayikho nemidlalo nemigcobo ezonwabisayo ngokweentlanga ngeentlanga. Sasikwajongene nootsotsi kunye neentwazana ezithengisa ngemizimba. Ababhali abathe banefuthe ekubhaleni kwam baquka aba: uW.K. Thamsanqa ngencwadi yakhe ethi "Buzani kubawo," uP.T. Mtuze ngeyakhe ethi "Alitshoni Lingaphumi," kunye no L.L. Sebe ngencwadi yakhe ethi "Ucamngco."
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Moya, Mlandeli Wellington
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Short stories, Xhosa
- Language: Xhosa , English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7235 , vital:21231
- Description: My short stories are about the circumstances in which black gold miners in Welkom in the 1980s and 1990s found themselves. These mineworkers - I was one of them - made up a large, uneducated segment of personnel because our work required strength and good health only. We came from all over the African continent. The places we had to live in were like jails or military barracks, sometimes with twenty or more of us sharing a single room. Because of these conditions, we shared our pains, and the pains of wives, children and relatives of those who were killed or disabled by their work, the repatriation of those who lost their capacity to continue working because of accidents and work, and work-related illnesses. We did not share the same language, and so we had to learn Fanakalo, the language of South African mine workers. My stories show how pain and happiness rub shoulders with each other in the miners' life, because besides the dangerous work there was also cultural entertainment, religious practices, robbery by tsotsis, and many prostitutes. The book Buzani Kubawo by Witness K. Tamsanqa has been an important influence on my writing. Other influences have been L.L. Sebe's Ucamngco and P.T. Mtuze's Alitshoni Lingaphumi. , La mabali angeemeko zabembi-migodi baseWelkom phaya kwiminyaka ephakathi koo-1980 noo-1990. Aba basebenzi, endandingomnye wabo, babeliqela elivisayo elingafundanga — bezingca ngamandla. Sasiphuma mbombo zonke zeli lase-Afrika. Indawo esasihlala kuyo ibifana nqwa nezisele zentolongo okanye izindlu zasemkhosini. Amashumi amabini amadoda elala ndlwini - nye. Ngenxa yaloo meko sachubelana amabali ngeemeko zobomi bethu, ngabafazi nabantwana, nezizalwane, nangeengozi esasingena kuzo nokugoduswa kwabo bagulayo. Kwathi kuba sasithetha iilwimi ngeelwimi safundiswa isiFanakalo. Amabali am abonisa iintlungu ezayame kulonwabo kuloo meko yasemigodini kuba yayikho nemidlalo nemigcobo ezonwabisayo ngokweentlanga ngeentlanga. Sasikwajongene nootsotsi kunye neentwazana ezithengisa ngemizimba. Ababhali abathe banefuthe ekubhaleni kwam baquka aba: uW.K. Thamsanqa ngencwadi yakhe ethi "Buzani kubawo," uP.T. Mtuze ngeyakhe ethi "Alitshoni Lingaphumi," kunye no L.L. Sebe ngencwadi yakhe ethi "Ucamngco."
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Happiness is somebody’s name
- Authors: Jijana, Thabo
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7268 , vital:21237
- Description: This collection of loosely interlinked short stories is a “book of imaginary beings”. It draws its influence from amaXhosa history, religion and mythology. Written in a fluid blend of isiXhosa and English, the stories make use of innovative forms and an inventive, pared-down language to create new and strange perspectives on our past, present and future. Ranging in length from brief mini-sagas to longer vignettes, the collection touches on such diverse subjects as the lore and superstitions surrounding the mythical being of tokoloshe, sorcery in the black community, and other fantastical elements of amaXhosa folklore. Literary influences include the Syrian writer Osama Olamar, whose writing about inanimate and everyday objects is both interesting and rare; Amos Tutuola, whose appropriation of Yoruba mythology I have learned much from; the Argentinian writer Julio Cortazar who has the facility to articulate the fantastical in a straightforward narrative; and Taban Lo Liyong, the Ugandan writer, whose fabulist work has served as stimulus for many of these stories.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Jijana, Thabo
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Short stories, South African (English) 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7268 , vital:21237
- Description: This collection of loosely interlinked short stories is a “book of imaginary beings”. It draws its influence from amaXhosa history, religion and mythology. Written in a fluid blend of isiXhosa and English, the stories make use of innovative forms and an inventive, pared-down language to create new and strange perspectives on our past, present and future. Ranging in length from brief mini-sagas to longer vignettes, the collection touches on such diverse subjects as the lore and superstitions surrounding the mythical being of tokoloshe, sorcery in the black community, and other fantastical elements of amaXhosa folklore. Literary influences include the Syrian writer Osama Olamar, whose writing about inanimate and everyday objects is both interesting and rare; Amos Tutuola, whose appropriation of Yoruba mythology I have learned much from; the Argentinian writer Julio Cortazar who has the facility to articulate the fantastical in a straightforward narrative; and Taban Lo Liyong, the Ugandan writer, whose fabulist work has served as stimulus for many of these stories.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
I did not die
- Authors: Mzamo, Tebello
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7246 , vital:21232
- Description: My novella is about a mine worker and his family. Set in both Lesotho and South Africa, it engages the effects of migrant labour on families in post-apartheid South Africa. Told through the eyes of the different family members, the narrative uses shifting points of view and moves fluidly through time to present an intimate but complex view of the lives of ordinary working class people. It incorporates witchcraft and ghosts to reveal the blurred lines between the realms of life and death. This collection is inspired by my own father who is a former mine worker. I am influenced by Joyce Carol Oates and Chibundu Onuzo's darkly realistic style, Veronique Tadjo’s explorations of migration and death, the family chronicles of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor. I am also inspired by female fantasy and horror writers such as those collected in Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s anthology, Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Mzamo, Tebello
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7246 , vital:21232
- Description: My novella is about a mine worker and his family. Set in both Lesotho and South Africa, it engages the effects of migrant labour on families in post-apartheid South Africa. Told through the eyes of the different family members, the narrative uses shifting points of view and moves fluidly through time to present an intimate but complex view of the lives of ordinary working class people. It incorporates witchcraft and ghosts to reveal the blurred lines between the realms of life and death. This collection is inspired by my own father who is a former mine worker. I am influenced by Joyce Carol Oates and Chibundu Onuzo's darkly realistic style, Veronique Tadjo’s explorations of migration and death, the family chronicles of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor. I am also inspired by female fantasy and horror writers such as those collected in Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s anthology, Sisters of the Revolution: A Feminist Speculative Fiction Anthology.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
I want to believe there is a girl here under the table
- Authors: Asfour, Fouad-Martin
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7190 , vital:21227
- Description: Written in non-linear fragments, my thesis is what Audre Lorde in her novel Zami calls a "biomythography" - the weaving together of myth, history and biography in epic narrative form, a style of composition that represents all the ways in which we perceive the world. Using repetition and shifting memories, I draw from my bicultural upbringing in Offenbach, a city in Germany populated mostly by migrants, as well as my experience of working in art and culture internationally, travelling and living in different countries. Interrogating objects, buildings, family photographs, books and movies, and listening to the silences of the unvoiced, I upset and play with experiences of othering, assumptions and expectations about identity and ask questions about home, belonging and migration, mother tongue and translation. I draw inspiration from Korean American artist Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's use of texts, documents and images to explore dislocation and memory, as well as authors who engage language, translation and belonging such as Mikhail Shishkin, Yoko Tawada, Gloria Anzaldua and Mohammed Khair-Eddine.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Asfour, Fouad-Martin
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7190 , vital:21227
- Description: Written in non-linear fragments, my thesis is what Audre Lorde in her novel Zami calls a "biomythography" - the weaving together of myth, history and biography in epic narrative form, a style of composition that represents all the ways in which we perceive the world. Using repetition and shifting memories, I draw from my bicultural upbringing in Offenbach, a city in Germany populated mostly by migrants, as well as my experience of working in art and culture internationally, travelling and living in different countries. Interrogating objects, buildings, family photographs, books and movies, and listening to the silences of the unvoiced, I upset and play with experiences of othering, assumptions and expectations about identity and ask questions about home, belonging and migration, mother tongue and translation. I draw inspiration from Korean American artist Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's use of texts, documents and images to explore dislocation and memory, as well as authors who engage language, translation and belonging such as Mikhail Shishkin, Yoko Tawada, Gloria Anzaldua and Mohammed Khair-Eddine.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Jah Hills
- Authors: Slasha, Unathi
- Date: 2017
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7157 , vital:21222
- Description: Jah Hills is alone in Kwaf Indoda bush, waiting for elders to come, burn ibhuma and deliver him home. Two weeks before he departs from his initiation period, he is seduced by igqwirha. When he fails to satisfy her appetite, he gets ‘abducted and turned into isithunzela. One night, he narrowly escapes and finds his way back. But the experience at home is gruesome; they drive him away and want his death. My novel is fast paced, accumulating speed as it proceeds. It is formally experimental, drawing on forms that have gone before and trying to usher in a new manner of writing and looking at the world. It is told through the eyes of isithunzela that Jah Hills has become. It makes use of Nguni folklore, reimagined and subverted so it fits the character’s unearthly vision. Certain characters and moments from Nguni folktales are borrowed and appear throughout the text. Stylistically I draw extensively from the work of Sony Lab’ou Tansi, Taban Lo Liyong, Dambudzo Marechera, D.O. Fagunwa and Amos Tutuola.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Slasha, Unathi
- Date: 2017
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7157 , vital:21222
- Description: Jah Hills is alone in Kwaf Indoda bush, waiting for elders to come, burn ibhuma and deliver him home. Two weeks before he departs from his initiation period, he is seduced by igqwirha. When he fails to satisfy her appetite, he gets ‘abducted and turned into isithunzela. One night, he narrowly escapes and finds his way back. But the experience at home is gruesome; they drive him away and want his death. My novel is fast paced, accumulating speed as it proceeds. It is formally experimental, drawing on forms that have gone before and trying to usher in a new manner of writing and looking at the world. It is told through the eyes of isithunzela that Jah Hills has become. It makes use of Nguni folklore, reimagined and subverted so it fits the character’s unearthly vision. Certain characters and moments from Nguni folktales are borrowed and appear throughout the text. Stylistically I draw extensively from the work of Sony Lab’ou Tansi, Taban Lo Liyong, Dambudzo Marechera, D.O. Fagunwa and Amos Tutuola.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
On the shop-floor: ten years at Ford
- Authors: Cilibe, Mpumelelo
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Autobiographical fiction, South African (English) 21st century , Xhosa fiction 21st century , Short stories, Xhosa 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7257 , vital:21234
- Description: My autobiographical novella covers a period of my life between 1974 and 1984, when I worked at the Ford Motor company Struandale Assembly plant in Port Elizabeth. This period predated the formation of NUMSA (the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa) and COSATU - it was a time when automobile industry workers broke away from the race- based unions to form MACWUSA (Motor Assemblers and Component Workers Union of SA). Around the same time Rev Leon Sullivan was putting pressure on US companies, including Ford, to move away from apartheid labour practices. As quite an angry young man influenced by the Black Consciousness movement, I got deeply involved in union activities mainly for my own survival, and as a personal reaction to racism in the workplace. The story is told in a realist style, with many anecdotal detours giving the flavour of life in New Brighton in the 1980s. Important influences have been Bloke Modisane's autobiography, Blame Me on History and Studs Terkel's interviews of Ford plant workers and management in his book Working. , Growing up in New Brighton gave me so many stories that had never been written before but that were told person to person by the residents of my neighbourhood. Some of the tales in this collection are based on such stories. Others are stories that are reminiscent of childhood while growing up with an elder brother. I take the inspiration from different books that are in line with the stories that I am writing: collections of Extreme Fiction - Fabulists and Formalists that were edited by Robin Hemley and Michael Martone and The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade edited by Jeremy Robert Johnson and Cameron Pierce. Some stories by L.L. Ngewu and L.S. Ngcangata, and a novellette by P.T. Mtuze, Alitshoni Lingaphumi, also bring much influence as they reveal suffering in the lives of black people who endured forced removals, and other situations that are of interest to build my stories on. , Le ngqokolela yamabali iqulathe amabali asekelwe kumabali endandiweva ebaliswa ebuntwaneni bam ndisakhula. Amanye amabali angeenkumbulo zasebuntwaneni ngethuba ndandikhula nomkhuluwa wam ongasaphiliyo. Ifuthe lokuwaqamba ndilifumene kwiincwadi zababhali abanje ngabo bafumaneka kwiingqokolela ezihlelwe nguRobin Hemley no Michael Martone kwincwadi ethi Extreme Fiction - Fabulists and Formalists, noJeremy Robert Johnson enoCameron Pierce kwingqokolela ethi, The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade. Amanye amabali abenefuthe ndiwafumene kwiincwadi zooP.T. Mtuze, kwinovella yakhe ethi Alitshoni Lingaphumi, nakwezoL.L. Ngewu noL.S. Ngcangatha apho babalisa ngobomi basekuhlaleni ngexesha abantu babedudulwa befuduswa ngetshova ukususwa kwiindawo zabo zokuhlala. , This thesis is presented in two parts: English and isiXhosa
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Cilibe, Mpumelelo
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African fiction (English) 21st century , Autobiographical fiction, South African (English) 21st century , Xhosa fiction 21st century , Short stories, Xhosa 21st century
- Language: English , Xhosa
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7257 , vital:21234
- Description: My autobiographical novella covers a period of my life between 1974 and 1984, when I worked at the Ford Motor company Struandale Assembly plant in Port Elizabeth. This period predated the formation of NUMSA (the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa) and COSATU - it was a time when automobile industry workers broke away from the race- based unions to form MACWUSA (Motor Assemblers and Component Workers Union of SA). Around the same time Rev Leon Sullivan was putting pressure on US companies, including Ford, to move away from apartheid labour practices. As quite an angry young man influenced by the Black Consciousness movement, I got deeply involved in union activities mainly for my own survival, and as a personal reaction to racism in the workplace. The story is told in a realist style, with many anecdotal detours giving the flavour of life in New Brighton in the 1980s. Important influences have been Bloke Modisane's autobiography, Blame Me on History and Studs Terkel's interviews of Ford plant workers and management in his book Working. , Growing up in New Brighton gave me so many stories that had never been written before but that were told person to person by the residents of my neighbourhood. Some of the tales in this collection are based on such stories. Others are stories that are reminiscent of childhood while growing up with an elder brother. I take the inspiration from different books that are in line with the stories that I am writing: collections of Extreme Fiction - Fabulists and Formalists that were edited by Robin Hemley and Michael Martone and The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade edited by Jeremy Robert Johnson and Cameron Pierce. Some stories by L.L. Ngewu and L.S. Ngcangata, and a novellette by P.T. Mtuze, Alitshoni Lingaphumi, also bring much influence as they reveal suffering in the lives of black people who endured forced removals, and other situations that are of interest to build my stories on. , Le ngqokolela yamabali iqulathe amabali asekelwe kumabali endandiweva ebaliswa ebuntwaneni bam ndisakhula. Amanye amabali angeenkumbulo zasebuntwaneni ngethuba ndandikhula nomkhuluwa wam ongasaphiliyo. Ifuthe lokuwaqamba ndilifumene kwiincwadi zababhali abanje ngabo bafumaneka kwiingqokolela ezihlelwe nguRobin Hemley no Michael Martone kwincwadi ethi Extreme Fiction - Fabulists and Formalists, noJeremy Robert Johnson enoCameron Pierce kwingqokolela ethi, The Best Bizarro Fiction of the Decade. Amanye amabali abenefuthe ndiwafumene kwiincwadi zooP.T. Mtuze, kwinovella yakhe ethi Alitshoni Lingaphumi, nakwezoL.L. Ngewu noL.S. Ngcangatha apho babalisa ngobomi basekuhlaleni ngexesha abantu babedudulwa befuduswa ngetshova ukususwa kwiindawo zabo zokuhlala. , This thesis is presented in two parts: English and isiXhosa
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Red cotton
- Authors: Gantsho, Vangile
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African poetry (English) 21st century , South African poetry (English) Black authors , Lesbians, Black Poetry
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7213 , vital:21229
- Description: My collection of poetry is a deeply personal exploration of what it means to be black, queer, and woman in modern-day South Africa. I interrogate being non-conformist in both a traditional-cultural upbringing and a more liberal yet equally-oppressive urban socialisation. I question what we are taught about the body and the feminine sexual space, while also addressing the mother-daughter relationship as the first and most constant reference of womanhood. The collection moves fluidly between the erotic, the uncomfortable and grotesque, what is painful, and what is beautiful and longed-for. Working promiscuously across forms, I employ prose poetry, interspersed with lyrical interludes, in an attempt at a narrative effect similar to what Claudia Rankine achieves in Don't Let Me Be Lonely. I also draw from writers such as Calixthe Beyala (Your Name Shall Be Tanga), and Janice Lee (Damnation), as well as sex guides, women's blogs, and feminist poetry.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Gantsho, Vangile
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Creative writing (Higher education) South Africa , South African poetry (English) 21st century , South African poetry (English) Black authors , Lesbians, Black Poetry
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7213 , vital:21229
- Description: My collection of poetry is a deeply personal exploration of what it means to be black, queer, and woman in modern-day South Africa. I interrogate being non-conformist in both a traditional-cultural upbringing and a more liberal yet equally-oppressive urban socialisation. I question what we are taught about the body and the feminine sexual space, while also addressing the mother-daughter relationship as the first and most constant reference of womanhood. The collection moves fluidly between the erotic, the uncomfortable and grotesque, what is painful, and what is beautiful and longed-for. Working promiscuously across forms, I employ prose poetry, interspersed with lyrical interludes, in an attempt at a narrative effect similar to what Claudia Rankine achieves in Don't Let Me Be Lonely. I also draw from writers such as Calixthe Beyala (Your Name Shall Be Tanga), and Janice Lee (Damnation), as well as sex guides, women's blogs, and feminist poetry.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017