Mazisi Kunene
Mazisi Raymond Kunene (born May 12, 1930 in aMahlongwa , Natal , † August 11, 2006 in Durban ) was a South African poet, writer and civil rights activist .
Life
Kunene was born and raised in aMahlongwa in the south of Natal Province . He attended Kwa Hluzingcondo High School and obtained his matric at the school in Mariannhill . He graduated from Maphumolo Teachers' Training College with a teaching certificate . He studied Zulu literature at the University of Natal ; In 1956 he won the Bantu Literary Competition writing competition . In 1959 he began a doctorate at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London .
He fought against apartheid with poems in his mother tongue isiZulu . After moving to Great Britain, he founded the anti-apartheid movement there and in 1964 became UN representative of the African National Congress for Europe and Africa. He was also the ANC's Chief Representative for the United Kingdom and Western Europe . On behalf of UNESCO , he was visiting professor at various universities; from 1975 to 1992 he was a full professor of African languages and literature at the University of California in Los Angeles . In 1993 he returned to South Africa and henceforth taught at the University of Natal (later University of KwaZulu-Natal).
Mazisi Kunene has received numerous awards; in 1993 he was the first UNESCO Poet Laureate of the Arab and African countries. In 2005 he became a South African Poet Laureate. He died of complications from cancer, leaving behind his wife and a daughter and three sons.
Kunene's poem Europe, you laugh at the blind man was written for the concert cycle of 17 pieces of music for 2 recorders, chitarrone, viola da gamba and harpsichord and 16 texts about the exile From the black earth of this world (1992) by the composer Friedemann Schmidt- Mechau used.
Works (selection)
- Zulu Poems , 1970
- Emperor Shaka the Great , 1979
- Anthem of the Decades , 1981
- The Ancestors and the Sacred Mountain , 1982
Awards
- 1993: Tchicaya U Tam'si Prize
Web links
- Literature by and about Mazisi Kunene in the catalog of the German National Library
- Portrait at sahistory.org.za (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Mazisi Kunene Zulu poet and ANC activist born. sahistory.org.za, accessed December 13, 2018
- ↑ a b c d portrait at sahistory.org.za (English), accessed on December 13, 2018
- ↑ Description of the work at schmidt-mechau.de, accessed on December 13, 2018
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Kunene, Mazisi |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Kunene, Mazisi Raymond (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | South African poet, writer and civil rights activist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 12, 1930 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | aMahlongwa |
| DATE OF DEATH | August 11, 2006 |
| Place of death | Durban |