Revisionings and Adaptions of Shakespeare in the Fiction of André Brink

Abstract

Steven Mufson has contended that the strikes, demonstrations, and the stamping of feet that characterized the years of Black rebellion to apartheid “were only surface signs of a more profound and long-lasting change in the way blacks saw themselves and their place within society” (159). Mufson locates that change which he exalts above any particular organization or protest in the flourishing culture of revolt which marked the fighting years. Drawing attention to the appropriation of Shakespeare for the cultural onslaught against apartheid, Mufson meditates on the significance of the life and career of Solomon T. Plaatje. Journalist, novelist, pamphleteer and politician, Plaatje, Mufson argues, through his translations of Shakespeare's A Comedy of Errors, The Merchant of Venice, Othello, Much Ado about Nothing and Julius Caesar into Sechuana had made Shakespeare available to many black South Africans.

Shakespeare in Southern Africa Vol. 14 2002: pp. 1-10