Novel
An African Tragedy
R. R. R. Dhlomo · 1928
Synopsis
A short novel in four chapters, the first of which is entitled “The Ills of Urban Life”. It follows two lovers from the countryside whom the city corrupts, and takes the form of a Christian fable of sin and forgiveness. The plot is not known in more detail; its characters are named Robert Zulu, Jane Nhlauzeko, Daniel Zibi and Ma-Radebe.
Context
The book appeared in 1928 from the press of the Lovedale missionary institution, as a forty-page booklet, with the subtitle “a novel in English by a Zulu writer”. It predates Sol Plaatje's Mhudi by two years. Its author, who had published moral tales in the black press, later turned to Zulu, the language of his subsequent novels; his short stories were collected only in 1975, after his death.
Who it is for
A forty-page novella in English, with a moral and Christian purpose, that can be read in one sitting.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the first work of fiction by a Black writer from the country to appear in book form, even before Plaatje's novel.
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