Shane Moran - Alternation Journal
Shane Moran - Alternation Journal
Shane Moran - Alternation Journal
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English literature and ".<br />
It has been ai-gued that the exposure La Gurna received during t<br />
which inevitably drew his attention to the need to address an international audienc<br />
\yell, inay have inadvertently led to apparent contradictions between his politics and<br />
rature's serving historically specific political ends is thrown back into<br />
' is somewhat problematic. Moreover, to make reference to 'La Guma's<br />
t the relationship between culture and politics after his exile' or<br />
aesthetic construction of his work, as exemplified in TIrrze yf [he Rzrtcherhir<br />
According to this view, this contradiction may be attributed not only to La Guln<br />
condition of enforced exile, which deprived him of the benefit of writing on<br />
'intimately known community', but also to his changing 'aesthetic ideolo<br />
(Maughan-Brown 1991:32f)''. Drawing on the statement made by La Gurna in<br />
interview with Robert Serumaga in 1966, in which La Guma indicates his attempt<br />
ce suggests that it was not until La Guma was in exile that he started throwing<br />
s-a factor that seeins to have been overlooked in Maughangainst<br />
this background, then, 1 would argue that if there are any traces<br />
achieve a 'universality of opinion' by moving beyond a set of apartheid-create<br />
'compartments', Maughan-Brown (1991:35,34) detects in La Guma 'an element<br />
aesthetic back-tracking', the evidence of which is provided, inle~, c~lia, by what<br />
gs us to the place of La Guma's<br />
perceives as La Guma's residual belief in the 'universals of traditionalist criticism'.<br />
One cannot dispute the traces of a liberal humanist aesthetic in some of La 011th African realist debate<br />
Guina's extra-fictional statements. However, La Gurna's use of 'universality' in this ma's work has always been at the centre of the realist debate in South Africa-a<br />
context seeins to have a lot to do with the writer's will to transcend the barriers ofrace in<br />
ndication that he is known as one of the writers in South Africa who is seen as<br />
his writing-hence La Guma's reference to the failure of writers to 'prosect ition. This debate was initiated by<br />
ithemselves) across the colour line' earlier in that interview-and as such it rnay be in his 1967 essay, that there was a lack of<br />
seen as La Guma's reflection on the charterist position (or the pluralism of the ANC as n-'indigenous' or 'alien'-in South African literature written by Blacks.<br />
some people have called it). It could also be argued that La Gulna conflates uliiversality<br />
with revolutionary internationalism as can be inferred from his assertion that the writer<br />
what one gets from black South African writing, Nkosi (1979:222) went on to<br />
aginative literature' without<br />
'tries to spread out, extend his views, extend his opinions and get opinions from other<br />
sources so tliat iic doesn't become confined to his ivory tower'; or the argument that<br />
'universal ideas could still be expressed' even if one is writing 'within a pal-ticular<br />
a1 facts into artistically persuasive<br />
environment"". Viewed from this perspective, then, Maughan-Brown's d' documentary realist narrative.<br />
assertion that once 'the concept of universals is accepted, the wliole qLies ts who, according to Nkosi, have failed to 'transmute given social<br />
rtistically persuasive works of fiction', is Richard Rive in whose novel,<br />
ilure 'in characterisation and imaginative<br />
-- an situation with which he is dealing'.<br />
r Alex la Guma who, despite the fact that<br />
I'<br />
In ail irlter-view both Apolion Ilavidson and Vlatlimir Sliubin coi~tirmed that 1,a Gunia's<br />
writings wcrc popular in Russia.<br />
''<br />
Fcinbcrg stated to tlie author that Gums's later novcls were aimed at eliciting international<br />
solidarity because it was fclf tliat an intcmational awareness campaign would bring more<br />
riters have so exhaustively worked up'<br />
ptimism ('his enthusiasm for life as it is<br />
sugporters to the cause. La G~irna indicated in a letter to Jane Grant that his targct had not really<br />
been an iiiternational audience. .I nevq actually have a Coreign readership in mind. but wrote,<br />
and continue to write. the way 1 believe the story or novel should be written accorili~lg to the<br />
gospel ofAlex IaGurna' (LaGumai11 Grant 1978:49).<br />
"<br />
Somc .aiiomaIics' that Mai~ghali-Brown notes in his critical essay on 7i.m~ of the<br />
B2irchevbivdwerc idcntificdearlier by MbuleloMzalnane ( 1985:391).<br />
'"<br />
In a Icttel- to Crranl (I 978:50) 1.a Guma riiakes this explicit: 'thc revolution is intcrliational,<br />
and if lliy characters act out their parts on the Soutll Af'rican stage. I hope they are also saying<br />
sometil~ng to non-South Afl-icans'.<br />
n and ilnagii~ative power to do justice to the desperate human situation'<br />
in the Night despite its employment of<br />
ich the central thrust of Nkosi's essay seems to be aimed at<br />
J.M. Coetzee picks up this point more<br />
ly. Coetzee argues in his 197 1 essay, 'Alex la Guina and the Responsibilities of<br />
uth African Writer' that 'the Western line of experimentation' (which Nkosi<br />
seem to 'perpetuate a rift between the writer and society at large'