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9
Contents
editorial
DON LETTS & SINÉAD O’CONNOR
Trouble of the World
MOEMEDI KEPADISA
A useful study in Democracy
FRED HO
Why Music Must Be Revolutionary – and How It Can Be
LOUIS CHUDE-SOKEI
Walking With Sound: Race and the Prosthetic Ear
Theme Lefifi Tladi
NUNU NGEMA
A Portrait of Ntate Lefifi Victor Tladi
MASELLO MOTANA
Tladi Lefifing!
SHEBA LO
Munti wa Marumo (Return to the source): Lefifi Tladi’s Cultural Contributions to the Struggle 1970-1980
SHANNEN HILL
CREATING CONSCIOUSNESS - Black Art in 1970s South Africa
EUGENE SKEEF
Convergence at the OASIS
LEFIFI TLADI
One More Poem For Brother Dudu Pukwana
DAVE MARKS
Liner Notes
PONE MASHIANGWAKO
My Journey with Mammoths: Motlhabane Mashiangwako and Lefifi Tladi.
GEOFF MPHAKATI & ARYAN KAGANOF
Giant Steps
ES’KIA MPHAHLELE
Renaming South Africa
LERATORATO KUZWAYO
Boitemogelo - Definitions of consciousness draped in Blackness
BRIDGET THOMPSON
Piecing Together Our Humanity and Consciousness, Through Art, Life and Nature: Some thoughts about friendship with the artist, musician and wordsmith: Lefifi Tladi
LEFIFI TLADI with REZA KHOTA & HLUBI VAKALISA
Water Diviner
PALESA MOKWENA
Bra Si and Bra Victor: The Black Consciousness Artists Motlhabane Mashiangwako & Lefifi Tladi
FRÉDÉRIC IRIARTE
Proverbs
ARYAN KAGANOF
Lefifi Tladi – The Score
DAVID LOCKE
Simultaneous Multidimensionality in African Music: Musical Cubism
MORRIS LEGOABE
A Portrait of Motlhabane Simon Mashiangwako, Mamelodi, 1978
ZIM NGQAWANA & LEFIFI TLADI
Duet of the Seraphim
PERFECT HLONGWANE
Voices in the Wilderness: A Trans-Atlantic Conversation with LEFIFI TLADI
LEFIFI TLADI with JOHNNY MBIZO DYANI & THABO MASHISHI
Toro for Bra Geoff
LEKGETHO JAMES MAKOLA
Facebook Post May 24 2023
KOLODI SENONG
Darkness After Light: Portraits of Lefifi Tladi
LEFIFI TLADI
The African Isness of Colour
EUGENE SKEEF
A Portrait of Lefifi Tladi, an Alchemist Illuminating Consciousness, London, 1980s.
galleri
BELKIS AYÓN
intitulada
LIZE VAN ROBBROECK & STELLA VILJOEN
Corpus of Ecstasy: Zanele Muholi at Southern Guild
BADABEAM BADABOOM
Excerpts from the genius cult book of black arts
PETKO IORDANOV
African Wedding (super8mm 9fps)
ANTHONY MUISYO
folk tales and traditions, the algorithm, ancient history and the city of Nairobi
NHLANHLA DHLAMINI
How to Fight the Robot Army and Win?
DZATA: THE INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGICAL CONSCIOUSNESS
A Repository of Thought
borborygmus
AMOGELANG MALEDU
Colonial collections as archival remnants of reclamation and (re)appropriation: reimagining the silenced Isigubu through Gqom
MALAIKA MAHLATSI
Townships were never designed for family recreation
BONGANI TAU
Can I get a witness: sense-less obsessions, brandism, and boundaries by design
SALIM WASHINGTON
The Unveiling
DYLAN VALLEY
Benjamin Jephta: “Born Coloured, Not Born Free”
EUGENE THACKER
Song of Sorrow
STANLEY ELKIN
The Flamenco Dancer
KEVIN BISMARK COBHAM
Plasticizing Frantz and Malcolm. Ventriloquism. Instrumentalization.
ARTURO DESIMONE
What the Devil do they Mean When they Say “Crystal Clear?’’
frictions
DIANA FERRUS
My naam is Februarie/My name is February
AFURAKAN
8 Poems From Poverty Tastes Like Fart! Ramblings, Side Notes, Whatever!
KHULILE NXUMALO & SIHLE NTULI
The Gcwala Sessions
LESEGO RAMPOLOKENG
Gwala Reloaded
ARI SITAS
Jazz, Bass and Land
ZOE BOSHOFF & SABITHA SATCHI
Love, War and Insurrection - A discussion about poetry with Ari Sitas
RICO VERGOTINE
Botmaskop (Afrikaanse Mistress)
RAPHAEL D’ABDON
kings fools and madwomen (after dario fo and janelle monae)
claque
JIJANA
home is where the hut is - Notes for a future essay on Ayanda Sikade’s Umakhulu
MATTHIJS VAN DIJK
Bow Project 2: Bowscapes – In Memory of Jürgen Bräuninger
PATRICK LEE-THORP
A discourse in the language of the Global North based on the colonial history of copyright itself: Veit Erlmann's Lion’s Share.
PERFECT HLONGWANE
A close reading of Siphiwo Mahala’s Can Themba – The Making and Breaking of an Intellectual Tsotsi: A Biography
RITHULI ORLEYN
The Anatomy of Betrayal: Molaodi wa Sekake’s Meditations from the Gutter
NCEBAKAZI MANZI
Captive herds. Erasing Black Slave experience
KARABO KGOLENG
Chwayita Ngamlana’s If I Stay Right Here: a novel of the digital age
WAMUWI MBAO
Nthikeng Mohlele’s The Discovery of Love: a bloodless collection.
RONELDA KAMFER
The Poetry of Victor Wessels: black, brooding black
NATHAN TRANTRAAL
Ons is gevangenes van dit wat ons liefhet: Magmoed Darwiesj gedigte in Afrikaans
ARYAN KAGANOF
Khadija Heeger's Thicker Than Sorrow – a witnessing.
KYLE ALLAN
Zodwa Mtirara’s Thorn of the Rose
ADDAMMS MUTUTA
Third Cinema, World Cinema and Marxism without a single African Author?
ekaya
NDUDUZO MAKHATHINI
Spirituality in Bheki Mseleku’s Music
ESTHER MARIE PAUW
Africa Open Improvising & AMM-All Stars
STEPHANUS MULLER
An interview with Jürgen Bräuninger and Sazi Dlamini
off the record
TSITSI ELLA JAJI
Charlotte Manye Maxeke: Techniques for Trans-Atlantic Vocal Projection
KGOMOTSO RAMUSHU
Skylarks and Skokiaan Queens: Jazz women as figures of dissent
OLIVIER LEDURE
Some Posters and LP Covers of South African JAZZ Designed by South African Artists
HERMAN LATEGAN
Memories of Sea Point
ANDERS HØG HANSEN
Sixto and Buffy: Two Indigenous North American Musical Journeys
REINBERT DE LEEUW
Sehnsucht
RICK WHITAKER
The Killer in Me
feedback
VANGILE GANTSHO
Thursday 8 December 2022
KEV WRIGHT
Monday 2 January 2023
WILLIAM KELLEHER
Wednesday, 1 February 2023
STEFAN MAYAKOVSKY
Thursday 2 March 2023
FACEBOOK FEEDBACK
Facebook
herri_gram FEEDBACK
Instagram
the selektah
TENDAYI SITHOLE
Underground: The Sphere of 2SMan
PhD
DIE KOORTJIE UNDERCOMMONS
Inhoudsopgawe
INGE ENGELBRECHT
1. Entering the undercommons
INGE ENGELBRECHT
2. Conserve undercommons
INGE ENGELBRECHT
3. Die Kneg en die Pinksterklong
INGE ENGELBRECHT
4. To be or not to be
INGE ENGELBRECHT
5. Ôs is dai koortjie
INGE ENGELBRECHT
6. Decoding die koortjie
INGE ENGELBRECHT
7. Die Holy of Holies
INGE ENGELBRECHT
8. Epilogue
hotlynx
shopping
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contributors
the back page
DOROTHEE RICHTER
(NON-)THINGS or Why Nostalgia for the Thing is Always Reactionary
ANASTASYA VANINA
War
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Archive About Contact Africa Open Institute
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    #09
  • claque

NATHAN TRANTRAAL

Ons is gevangenes van dit wat ons liefhet: Magmoed Darwiesj gedigte in Afrikaans

Toerie digter Magmoed Darwiesj ses jaa oud was, hettie Israeli Army Birwe ge-occupy en geraze. It wassie plek waa Darwiesj gebore was en grootgeraak et. Sy familie, soes anne Palestinian families het geflee vanafie inevitable massacres wat sou follow. ’n Jaa later kommie familie trug narie land as “illegals,” en settle in Dayr al-Asad. Maa hulle terugkoms val byte die timeframe vannie census soe, hulle wôtie ingetel innie families wat gebly et ennie massacres survive et ie. Instead earn hulle ’n niewe label, “internal refugees.” Legally geclassify as “present-absent alien.” Dai drie woore as jyrit opbriek: present, absent, alien is miskien die beste beskrywing vannie gedigte wat Darwiesj later sou skryf. Die storie van Darwiesj se kinne jare sal vi Kafka envious maak.

Magmoed Darwiesj se gedigte het openly rebel tienie Israeli occupation van Palestine, en hy moes eventually in exile gan. Maa hy het nooit ophou trugskryfie. In tyd het hy een vannie Arabic wêreld se most loved en respected digters gewôd. ’n Poet wat loved is dee kinnes en adults alike. Darwiesj, die author van several novels en 20 poetry collections is dood in 2008 anne hat anval. Maa hy losse literary legacy wat vi decades nog sal resonate mettie Arab world. die Vlug van ’n Vreemdeling isse anthology van Darwiesj se collected poems in Afrikaans, vetaal dee Bester Meyer en ytgegie dee Naledi.

Die leit motif van gevangenis is belangrik om te vestaan as jy Darwiesj lies. Omdat Darwiesj tot in sy essence ’n mens trapped in confinement is, waa oekal hy might gan. Exile, it seems, warp die wêreld, en ve’anne die familiar confines vannie hys into symbols van liberation, tewyl die broader expanse ’n sprawling open air tronk wôd. In sy gedig, Die hoep-hoep, offer Darwiesj ’n glimpse into die feeling van displacement:

Ons is gevangenes van dit wat ons liefhet,
dit wat ons begeer
en dit wat ons is.

Darwiesj was die reluctant representative van sy mense, soes explored innie 2014 documentary Write down, I am an Arab. Innie film express Darwiesj candidly,

“I don’t like to represent. I barely represent myself.”

En tog represent hy met al sy gedigte die plight van oppressed Palestinians. Dié sense van imprisonment rear wee sy kop innie forbidden love affair tussenie Palestinian, Darwiesj en sy Israeli lover, Tamar Ben Ami. Oo wie hy van sy mooiste gedigte geskryf et. Die mees renowned van die gedigte, Rita en die geweer isse aching poem oo longing en separation,

Tussen my oë en Rita
is daar ’n geweer —
en wie Rita ook al ken
gaan kniel en aanbid
die heiligheid
in die heuningkleur oë

Tussen ons
is daar miljoene swaeltjies
en beelde
en baie rendevouz
onder skoot
van ’n geweer —

Die spector vannie Israeli occupation van Palestine is ever present in Darweisj se gedigte. Dit issie tronk wat hy nooit kan escape ie. Sy taal en images is bound an en intertwined mette forever oolog. Liefde, estrangement, loss en politics intertwine seamlessly dee Darwiesj se body of work. Elke gedig bear traces van al die elements, al oscillate hulle in prominence vanaf een gedig narie volgenne. It is no surprise as hy ’n gun introduce inne love poem. It is expected. 

It is onmoontlik om sy gedigte te categorise in binary terms. Die universality van Darwiesj se writing extend yt sy metaphor van Palestine as sy lost Garden of Eden. It isse metaphor vi alle displaced mense. Whether ôs praat van refugees, offie descendants van slaves wat liewe as second class citizens innie land waa hulle gebore was.

Ek is ’n Adam van die twee Edens —
Ek het die paradys twee keer verloor.
Verdryf my daarom stadig.
En vermoor my stadig.
– onder ’n olyfboom –
saam met Lorca.

Binne die Afrikaanse literatuur is daa stêk ooeenkomste tussen Darwiesj se approach en dit van Kaapse Afrikaans writers. Most apparent in sy gebryk van free verse, maa oppe dieper level in sy manier van metaphor gebryk, en hoe die gedigte gedryf wôd dee ’n musicality en rhythm. Die skrywer is self aware van sy rol as digter, soes beautifully vasgelê innie gedig, Die Dobelaar:

My enigste hand in (’n)(dié) gedig
is om die ritme te gehoorsaam,
om haar beweging aan te voel,
een gewaarwording
wat in ’n ander verander
en voorgevoel wat betekenis openbaar:
bewusteloos in die eggo van woorde —
my self se toonbeeld
soos dit homself her-vestig
vanaf my “ek” na ’n ander —
my vertroue en hunkering
na fonteine van water.

It het my lat wonne of rhyme schemes en experimental forms miskien die domain is van peace time poets. Darwiesj isse war time poet, die chronicler vanne occupation. Sy weapons is sy woore. En mens kan sê, dat woore nie rêrag weapons issie, maa neither isse klip assie enemy ’n tank ry. Darwiesj se gedigte hettie natural beauty vanne olive tree, sy complex geometry hidden agte supple curves en warm texture. Die gedigte is simple genoeg virre kind om te vestaan en diep genoeg virre philosopher om velore in te raak.

Bester Meyer se vetaling van Darwiesj se gedigte is commendable al issit ’n bietjie workmanlike. It suffer klein bietjie asse result vannie feit dattit vetalings is van Engelse vetalings, ’n copy vanne copy, die sharpness vannie woore slightly diminished met elke pressing. Maa dai issie om te sê dat die gedigte sy effectiveness veloo nie. Bester se vetaling is soe loyal annie text soes mens possibly kan wies. Darwiesj isse belangrike skrywer, en een wie met South African readers deeply sal resonate. Bester se vetaling kan net die Afrikaans literature enrich.

Oppe final note, kon ekkie help ommit inherently strange te vind om Darwiesj se gedigte wat grootliks gan oo Israeli Apartheid te lies in Afrikaans ’n taal wat historically deeply rooted in Apartheid issie. Maa miskien is daa iets appropriate, selfs hopeful innie irony. Magmoed Darwiesj se gedigte het Afrikaner nationalism survive, om gelies te wôd inne niewe Syd-Afrika, miskien sallit eendag gelies wôd inne niewe Palestine.

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RONELDA KAMFER
ARYAN KAGANOF
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