By the time Nakasa moved to Johannesburg to work at Drum, the magazine's chaotic envisioning of black urban life had launched the careers of a cadre of talented black writers and photographers including Henry Nxumalo, Can Themba, Peter Ma-gubane, Ernest Cole, Todd Matshikiza and William (Bloke) Modisane. Educated at the moment when segregation cohered into apartheid, these men carried themselves brashly, rejecting their literary predecessors as conservative and woefully romantic, lacking the bite to respond to the dangerous world they inhabited. They saw themselves as an extension neither of an older black South African literary tradition nor of the community of white liberal South African novelists like Alan Paton, but rather in the mould of the Harlem Renaissance. They were, they believed, figures at the crossroads of a literary and social revolution that could redefine the meaning of blackness one photograph, short story or jazz piece at a time.16
Just as The Classic kicked into gear, however, Nakasa began to express deep frustration with life in South Africa, repeatedly complaining to friends and colleagues that he 'felt like hopping the next plane to go seek my fortune outside this hole'.44 Nakasa's disillusionment was fed in part by the growing danger of publishing literature in South Africa. In 1963, the same year as the first issue of The Classic was published, Parliament had passed the Publications and Entertainment Act, a piece of legislation that granted the state broad powers to ban or censor content it deemed unfavourable. This time around, the list included anything that was 'harmful to public morals', blasphemous, ridiculed 'any section of the inhabitants of the Republic', or posed a danger to the general peace. In the fall of 1963, for instance, Nakasa found himself forced to reject a short story submitted to The Classic since it was 'too hot to handle because [of] a rather bold bedroom angle', which he realized could catch the eye of the government censors and could spell death to the entire magazine.45
The Suit Short Story Can Themba 29.pdf
But to think of Nat Nakasa this way misses an important point: resistance to apartheid was acted out not by symbols but by people, moving through their lives without the moral clarity that historical hindsight affords. Such individuals are not simply shorthand for the injustices of apartheid - they are humans with sprawled and intricate lives that resist easy categorization. And unfortunately for those who would make an idol of Nakasa - or indeed any figure in modern South African history -deification does not hold up well to the scrutiny of detail.
1 For her indefatigable and patient advisement on this project, I would like to extend my deepest thanks to Karin Shapiro. Thanks are due as well to Heather Acott, Janet Ewald, Gail Gerhart, Alyssa Granacki, Brooke Hartley, Snayha Nath, Alan Venable, Andrew Walker, and especially to Rose Filler and Karlyn Forner for their valuable comments and support on various iterations of this project. I am also grateful to Thivhulayiwe Mutavhatsindi, who copied portions of the Nathaniel Nakasa Papers at the University of the Witwatersrand Historical Papers Collection for me and Kate Ryan, who translated Nakasa's police file from Afrikaans to English. Finally, I wish to acknowledge the generous financial support of the U.S. Department of State's Fulbright program for additional research conducted between September and November 2011. 2 Nat Nakasa, 'Native of Nowhere', The Classic, 1, 1 (1963), 73. 3 Matthew Keaney, "I Can Feel My Grin Turn to a Grimace": From Sophiatown Shebeens to the Streets of Soweto on the Pages of Drum, The Classic, New Classic, and Staffrider (Unpublished M.A. thesis, George Mason University, 2010), 128. Thanks to Matthew for correcting my previous misconceptions - and the historical record more generally - about the timing of Nakasa's death. 4 Interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 2010. 5 Historical and literary studies that provide a brief mention of Nat Nakasa include Peter Benson, '"Border Operators": Black Orpheus and the Genesis of Modern African Art and Literature', Research in African Literatures 14, 4 (1983), 431-73; Michael Chapman, The Drum Decade: Stories from the 1950s (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 1989); Walter Ehmeir, 'Publishing South African Literature in English in the 1960s', Research in African Literatures, 26, 1 (Spring 1995), 111-131; Ulf Hannerz, 'Sophiatown: The View from Afar, Journal of Southern African Studies, 20, 2 (June 1994), 181-193; Mike Nicol, A Good Looking Corpse (London: Secker & Warburg, 1991); R. Neville Choonoo, South Africas Alternative Press: Voices of Protest and Resistance, 1880-1960 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 252-265. Additionally, there are two literature Master's theses that focus on Nakasa's writing style: Heather Acott, 'Tactics of the Habitat: The Elusive Identity of Nat Nakasa' (Unpublished M.A. thesis, University of South Africa, 2008) and H.B. Singh, 'Nathaniel Nakasa, the Journalist as Autobiographer: A Crisis of Identity' (Unpublished M.A. thesis, University of Natal, 1990). By their nature, however, neither pays significant attention to his biography. The most detailed existing academic account of Nakasa's life is found instead in a biographical chapter within Matthew Keaney's Master's thesis,'"I Can Feel My Grin Turn to a Grimace": From Sophiatown Shebeens to the Streets of Soweto', which provides in particular new and rich analysis on the context of Nakasa's suicide. 6 The subject of biography's role in telling South African history has become an object of study and debate in recent years. See for example the exchange between Ciraj Rassool and Jonathan Hyslop in the South African Review of Sociology: Ciraj Rassool, 'Rethinking Documentary History and South African Political Biography', South African Review of Sociology, 41, 1 (2010), 28-55; Jonathan Hyslop, 'On Biography: A Response to Ciraj Rassool', South African Review of Sociology, 41, 2 (2010), 104-115. 7 Special thanks to Karin Shapiro and the students of her 'Modern South African History through Biography and Autobiography' course for first elucidating these themes to me. 8 Nat Nakasa, 'Snatching at the Good Life', The World of Nat Nakasa (Johannesburg: Picador Africa, 2005), 37. [ Links ] 9 'Cost of Coronation Heaviest in History, New York Times, 13 May 1937, 18. 10 For a more extensive discussion of this theme, see Saul Dubow, 'Introduction: South Africa's 1940s' in Saul Dubow and Alan Jeeves, eds., South Africas 1940s: Worlds of Possibilities (Cape Town: Double Storey, 2005), 1-19 and Deborah Posel, Vie Making of Apartheid: 1948-1961, Conflict and Compromise (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 23-60. 11 Basic biographical information on Nakasa's early years comes from his younger sister, Gladys Maphumulo. Telephone interview with Gladys Maphumulo, 7 November 2010. 12 Chamberlain Nakasa, Ivangeli Lokuz Akha or The Gospel of Self Help (Icindezelwe Ngabe Mission Press: Durban, 1941), 78. 13 'Zulu Lutheran High School: Junior Certificate Result - 1954', Ilanga Lase Natal, 5 February 1955, 15. 14 Theo Zindela, Ndazana: The Early Years ofNat Nakasa (Braamfontein: Skotaville Publishers, 1990), 10-11. 15 'The Press: South African Drumbeats', Time, 15 December, 1952. Accessed 12 October 2010. ,9171,820505,00.html 16 Lewis Nkosi, Home and Exile (London: Longmans, 1965), 4-5; Nat Nakasa, 'Writing in South Africa: A Speech at the University of the Witwatersrand', The World of Nat Nakasa (Johannesburg: Picador Africa, 2005), 230; R. Neville Choonoo, South Africas Alternative Press, 254. 17 Aluka: The Digital Library of Scholarly Resources from and about Africa, Suppression of Communism Act of 1950. Accessed 16 September, 2010. 18 Interview with Mongane Serote in Lauren Groenewald, Dir., Nat Nakasa: A Native of Nowhere (DVD, Times Media South Africa, 1999). 19 Anthony Sampson, Drum: An African Adventure - and Afterwards (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1956), 102. 20 For articles mentioned in this paragraph, see Nat Nakasa, 'Why Taximen are Terrified', Drum, March 1958, 30-35; 'Look What We Drink', Drum, February 1958, 15-16; 'The Life and Death of King Kong', Drum, February 1959, 29-32. 21 There was, of course, never a strict dichotomy between journalism and activism. Some Drum writers were also ANC or Communist Party members or otherwise involved in resistance activities. Prominent among them were Ezekiel (Es'kia) Mphahlele, Alex La Guma and Dennis Brutus. 22 South African History Archive, University of the Witwatersrand, AL3284: 'Mark Gevisser's Research Papers for Thabo Mbeki: The Dream Deferred', X11, Interview with Thabo Mbeki, 26 August 2000; Mark Gevisser, A Legacy of Liberation: Thabo Mbeki and the Future of the South African Dream (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 72. 23 Nat Nakasa, 'The Human Meaning of Apartheid', The New York Times Magazine, 24 September, 1961, 46. 24 The only Sharpeville-related content to appear during the State of Emergency was a photographic essay taken at the funeral of the victims. Photographs and accounts taken by Drum writers at the scene of the massacre, however, were published in many international outlets and helped build up global outrage against the National Party. Peter Magubane, 'Sharpeville Funeral', Drum, May 1960, 28-31; Tom Hopkinson, In the Fiery Continent (London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1962), 258. 25 Nat Nakasa, 'Over the Border', Drum, July 1960, 24-27. 26 National Archives (Pretoria), NTS 2769: 1623/301 Paspoort Lewis Nkosi; Karin Shapiro, 'No Exit? : The Politics of Emigration Restrictions in Early Apartheid South Africa' (Unpublished paper, North-eastern Workshop for Southern Africa Conference, April 2007), 9. 27 Walter Ehmeir, 'Publishing South African Literature in English in the 1960s', Research in African Literatures, 26, 1 (Spring 1995), 111-113. 28 Drum had once published fiction as well, but stopped for the most part in 1958, when the editorship turned over from Sylvester Stein, a lover of short fiction, to the hardnosed Tom Hopkinson, who came from a news background and believed the magazine should focus strictly on journalistic forms of writing. Jim Bailey agreed, arguing that crime, sports and gossip sold the magazine - not literary copy. For further detail, see Ehmeir, 'Publishing South African Literature in English in the 1960s', 115; Michael Chapman, The Drum Decade: Stories from the 1950s (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 1989), 216. 29 Nat Nakasa, 'Comment', 4. 30 Peter Benson, '"Border Operators": Black Orpheus and the Genesis of Modern African Art and Literature', Research in African Literatures, 14, 4 (1983), 442. 31 University of the Witwatersrand Historical Papers Collection, Nathaniel Nakasa Papers 1963-1984, B3, John Thompson to Nat Nakasa, 15 May 1962. 32 Farfield Foundation informational brochure quoted in Frances Saunders, The Cultural Cold War: The CIA and the World of Arts and Letters (New York: The New Press, 1999), 126. 33 Ibid., 117; 'Arab Magazine Banned by Cairo', New York Times, 24 July, 1966, 3. 34 Nakasa was not the only Drum writer to be caught up in C.I.A.-funded activities. While living abroad in Paris, Es'kia Mphahlele worked with the Congress for Cultural Freedom, an artistic philanthropic organization later revealed to be bankrolled by the C.I.A. British journalist Cecil Eprile, one-time editor-in-chief of both Drum and its sister paper the Golden City Post, who went on in the mid-1960s to head the London-based news service, 'Forum World Features', a C.I.A.-funded venture designed to provide sympathetic news coverage of American exploits abroad, particularly in Vietnam. Research into the C.I.A.'s cultural projects remains difficult due to the agency's refusal to declassify many materials related to the subject, including those concerning Nat Nakasa. See Roy Paterson, Residual Uncertainty: Trying to Avoid Intelligence and Policy Mistakes in the Modern World (Lanham: University Press of America, 2003), 71; Ruth Obee, Es'Kia Mphahlele: Themes of Alienation and African Humanism (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1999), 14. 35 Quoted in Peter Benson, "Border Operators", 442. 36 Ibid., 442. 37 The C.I.A. has denied the author's request to declassify its materials relating to Nakasa on the grounds that they constitute a matter of national security and that their disclosure would imperil sensitive intelligence sources and methods. An appeal is pending. 38 Nathaniel Nakasa Papers, B1, Nat Nakasa to Lewis Nkosi, 29 May 1963. 39 Contrast was also funded by the Farfield Foundation, as were several other literary magazines in Africa, including Transition, Black Orpheus and Encounter. 40 Ehmeir, 'Publishing South African Literature in English in the 1960s', 119-120. 41 Nakasa, 'Comment, 4. 42 'Your poems seem to me often to be more concerned with making a statement than with making a poem, he wrote. Nathaniel Nakasa Papers , B3, John Thompson to Nat Nakasa. 13 August 1963. 43 Barney Simon, 'My Years with The Classic: A Note', English in Africa, 7, 2 (Sept. 1980), 79. 44 Nathaniel Nakasa Papers, B1, Nat Nakasa to Arthur Maimane, 28 June 1963. 45 Nathaniel Nakasa Papers, B1, Nat Nakasa to Ezekiel (Es'kia) Mphahlele, 18 November 1963. 46 Interview with Allister Sparks, Johannesburg, 21 October 2011; Heather Acott, 'Tactics of the Habitat', 9. 47 Mongane Serote, "The Nakasa World', The World of Nat Nakasa (Johannesburg: Picador Africa, 2005), xxx. 48 Interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 2010. 49 Information in this paragraph comes from Karin Shapiro, 'No Exit? : The Politics of Emigration Restrictions in Early Apartheid South Africa, 4, 20. This paper is part of Shapiro's larger study on South African emigration law and policy between 1948 and 1994, which she has generously allowed me to draw upon for this article. 50 Thanks to Karin Shapiro for alerting me to the existence of these records. National Archives (Pretoria), BAO 3610: C100/6/2460, Paspoort Todd and Esme Matshikiza; BAO 3610: C100/6/2461 Paspoort Miriam Makeba; BAO 3471: C100/6/658 Paspoort Barbara Masekela; NTS 2752: 1155/301 Paspoort William Modisane; BAO 3563: C100/6/1813 Paspoort Sheila Cingo; NTS 2769: 1623/301 Paspoort Lewis Nkosi; Marion Scher, 'What I've Learnt: Hugh Masekela, Times Live, 30 October 2011. Accessed 20 November 2011. -i-ve-learnt-hugh-masekela 51 National Archives (Pretoria), BAO 3561: C100/6/1789, Paspoort Nathaniel Nakasa, 11. 52 Thanks to Heather Acott for first sending me a copy of this police file. South African History Archive, University of the Witwatersrand, AL2878, Freedom of Information Programme, B01.3.5.5, Department of Justice file for Nathaniel Nakasa, 1958-1965, 17. Translated by Kate Ryan. 53 Ibid., 4 54 Ibid., 9 55 Nat Nakasa, 'Met With Smiles and Questions', The Rand Daily Mail, 28 November 1964, 11. 56 See for instance 'South Africa, The Harvard Crimson, 16 March 1965. Accessed 10 February 2011. -africa-pthe-sds-will-sponsor/ 57 Nakasa's ten months in the United States are in many ways the most challenging part of his life to reconstruct because he published only two pieces of writing - a final column for The Rand Daily Mail and an essay for The New York Times - and appears to have made no close friends. Those who knew him then tend to speak vaguely of a 'shy and reticent' man with whom they occasionally ate lunch, talked, or attended class. When asked in 2010 about Nakasa's mental state near the end of his life, friend and fellow South African exile Hugh Masekela shook his head and said only, 'I didn't have that kind of relationship with him' In fact, it seems no one did - the most systematic and detailed record of his time in the United States is the surveillance file kept by the FBI to monitor his immigration status. However, these holes in the historical record are themselves telling. They reveal a life lived in soft focus, held at a distance from the people and experiences around it. In doing so, the gaps speak indirectly to how exile could have undone a talented writer like Nat Nakasa at what should have been the apex of his career. Telephone interview with Ray Jenkins, 28 February 2011; Gail Gerhart, email message to author 15 March 2011; Jennifer Leaning, email message to author, 31 March 2011; Tim Creery, email message to author, 19 June 2010; Parker Donham, email message to author, 10 March 2011; interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 12 2010. Gerhart, Leaning, Creery, and Donham were all Harvard/Radcliffe students distantly acquainted with Nakasa during his time in Cambridge, Jenkins was a fellow Nieman scholar. 58 Harold McDougall, 'Negro Students' Challenge to Liberalism', The Harvard Crimson, 31 May 1967. Accessed 9 April, 2011. -students-challenge-to-liberalism-pthe/ 59 I wish to thank Alan Venable for first sharing this source with me. Harold McDougall, 'To Nat', Harvard Yearbook (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1966), 130. 60 Nat Nakasa, 'Met With Smiles and Questions', 11. 61 Harold McDougall, 'To Nat', 130. 62 Telephone interview with Ray Jenkins, 28 February 2011. 63 Seeming to speak obliquely of his own experience, Nakasa wrote in the Times that the people he met in Harlem were 'like South African refugees who are desperate for a change back home but remain irrevocably in love with the country'. Nat Nakasa, 'Mr. Nakasa Goes to Harlem', New York Times Magazine, 7 February 1965, 48. 64 'Africa Symposium', The Harvard Crimson, 16 April 1965. Accessed 30 April 2010. -symposium-pnathaniel-nakasa-south-african/ 65 Kathleen Conwell, 'Letter to Nat Nakasa', The World of Nat Nakasa (Johannesburg: Picador Africa, 2005), xxxiii. 66 Immigration and FBI files on Nat Nakasa were declassified at the request of the author through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. United States Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services, File A13-968-005: Nathaniel Nakasa, In possession of author; Federal Bureau of Investigation File on Nathaniel Nakasa, 1964-65. Special Agent in Charge (SAC), Boston to Director, FBI, 28 April 1965, In possession of author. 67 Program. National Conference on South African Crisis and American Action, 21-23 March 1965. Accessed April 10 2011. Aluka. 68 Federal Bureau of Investigation File on Nathaniel Nakasa, 1964-65. Special Agent in Charge (SAC), Boston to Director, FBI, April 28 1965.. 69 John Gerhart, 'Silhouette: Nathaniel Nakasa', The Harvard Crimson, 31 March 1965. -nakasa-pthe-first-time-i/?print=1 70 Ibid. 71 Ibid. 72 Kathleen Conwell, 'Letter to Nat Nakasa', The World of Nat Nakasa, xxxiv. 73 Interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 2010. 74 My gratitude to Alan Venable for locating this article for me. Ray Jenkins, 'Memories of Nat Nakasa' (Unpublished manuscript: 1965). In possession of author. 75 Nat Nakasa, 'Mr. Nakasa Goes to Harlem', 40. 76 Interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 2010. 77 It is worth noting that the impressions of both Gordimer and Masekela on Nakasa's final months were recorded after his death, allowing them hindsight on the tragedy that may have influenced their recollections of this period. Telephone interview with Nadine Gordimer, 4 November 2010. 78 Interview with Hugh Masekela, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 12 October 2010. 79 John Thompson Interview in Lauren Groenewald, Dir., Nat Nakasa: A Native of Nowhere (DVD, Times Media South Africa, 1999). 80 Ibid; Matthew Keaney, '"I Can Feel My Grin Turn to a Grimace''', 128. 81 For further detail about the Nakasa Award, as well as a list of winners, see 'Awards', South African National Editors' Forum. Accessed 3 April 2011. 82 Jacob Zuma, 'Address at the SANEF Awards Dinner', South African Government Information, 30 June 2009. Accessed 1 April 2011. =461&sid=780&tid=799 83 This piece of legislation, the Protection of Information Bill, was passed in the National Assembly on 22 November 2011 by a vote of 229 to 107. As of the publication of this article, it was awaiting approval from the National Council of Provinces. Under the legislation's provisions, journalists who write about classified information can be subject to a prison term of up to twenty-five years. Faranaaz Parker, 'Black Tuesday: Secrecy Bill Passed in Parliament', The Mail and Guardian Online, 22 November 2011. Accessed 22 November 2011. 84 Jeff Radebe, 'Speech at the 2010 SANEF Awards Dinner', Politics Web, 26 July 2010. Accessed 4 April, 2011. 85 Peter McDonald, 'The Present is Another Country', LitNet, 13 September 2010. Accessed 4 April 2011. 86 Pippa Green, 'Nat Nakasa, Symbol of Exile's Loneliness, The Sunday Independent, 17 July, 1999. Accessed 10 February 2011. -africa/nat-nakasa-symbol-of-exile-s-loneliness-1.5760 87 Themba's tribute was meant to follow a poem by William Plomer, 'The Taste of the Fruit', which commemorated Nakasa and the Afrikaans poet Ingrid Jonker, who committed suicide the same week as he did. The piece, entitled "The Boy with the Tennis Racket,' was later published in The World of Nat Nakasa by Ravan Press (1975); 'Insert', The Classic, 1,1 (1963), 7; Barney Simon, 'My Years With The Classic: A Note', 78. 88 Nat Nakasa, 'On Writing in South Africa', The World of Nat Nakasa (Johannesburg: Picador Africa, 2005), 86. 2ff7e9595c
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