Athol Fugard

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Harold Athol Lannigan Fugard (born June 11, 1932 in Middelburg / Great Karoo in South Africa ) is a South African writer and playwright .

Life

Fugard grew up in Port Elizabeth . His mother had a strong influence on him and taught him the Boer tradition . He worked at the same time as a car mechanic, actor and journalist until he was able to study at the University of Cape Town on a scholarship , but he dropped out and hired as a sailor. Back in South Africa, he worked as an actor and editor in Johannesburg and Port Elizabeth and began his work as a playwright . In 1956 he married Sheila Fugard , whom he had met as an actress while performing one of his plays.

Fugard had first successes with No-Good Friday (1958) and Nongogo (1959). During the time of the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, he wrote the novel Tsotsi, which was only published 20 years later (which was filmed in 2005 and won the Oscar for “Best Foreign Language Film” in 2006 ), and several dramas dealing with the subject of racism , for example The Blood Knot (1961), People are Living There (1963) and Boesman and Lena (1966). He often worked with black actors such as Zakes Mokae . In the 1970s he wrote several dramas with the blacks John Kani and Winston Ntshona , including The Island, which is about the prison island Robben Island , on which Nelson Mandela was imprisoned at the time . Several of his plays were premiered at the Market Theater in Johannesburg. In the film Gandhi Fugard was seen as an actor. Fugard has been writing and publishing an autobiography in several volumes since 1995.

He has been separated from his wife with a new partner since 2014.

With Sheila Fugard, Athol Fugard has the daughter Liza Fugard, who also works as an actress and writer.

Works

  • Statements After an Arrest Under the Immorality Act (1972)
  • Sizwe Bansi is Dead (1972, German 1974)
  • The Island (1973)
  • Dimetos (1975)
  • Hello and Goodbye (1961; completed 1976)
  • A Lesson From Aloes (1978)
  • The Road to Mecca (1986)
  • My Children! My Africa! (1989)

Awards (selection)

Entrance to the Fugard Theater

In Cape Town there is the Fugard Theater named after him .

Filmography

Literary template
  • 2000: Buschmann and Lena (Boesman and Lena)
  • 2005: Tsotsi
script
  • 1980: Marigolds in August (Marigolds in August)
Director
  • 1991: The Road to Mecca (The road to Mecca)
actor
  • 1978: Gurdjieff - Meetings with remarkable men
  • 1980: Marigolds in August (Marigolds in August)
  • 1982: Gandhi
  • 1984: The Killing Fields
  • 1991: The Road to Mecca (The road to Mecca)

literature

  • Denis Walder: Athol Fugard. 2003.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Athol Fugard Gets Personal In 'Shadow of the Hummingbird' At Long Wharf. In: Hartford Courant, accessed April 28, 2017
  2. ↑ Honorary Members: Athol Fugard. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed March 10, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Fugard, Athol
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Fugard, Harold Athol Lannigan (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION South African writer
DATE OF BIRTH June 11, 1932
PLACE OF BIRTH Middelburg (Eastern Cape) , South Africa