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38 - The book in South Africa

from PART VI - SOUTH AFRICAN LITERATURE: CONTINUITIES AND CONTRASTS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 January 2012

David Attwell
Affiliation:
University of York
Derek Attridge
Affiliation:
University of York
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Summary

In 1980 the University of Cape Town offered its final-year undergraduates a specialist option entitled ‘The Book in Africa’ as part of its new African Literature programme. In his prospectus, the convenor, J. M. Coetzee, noted that it was a novel and potentially risky choice for students:

We will be exploring some of the determinants of literary production not often dealt with in literary studies: environmental pressures of all kinds on writers, the economics of publishing and distributing literary works, the nature of the readership of literary works, etc. Since much of the information required for this kind of study is not readily available, students are forewarned that the course will entail a certain amount of bibliographical ferreting and a certain amount of practical investigative research. (‘Book in Africa’)

There was, indeed, much ferreting. Among other things, Coetzee encouraged students to investigate ‘the location of bookstores in the Cape Peninsula and the types of clientele they serve’; ‘the library services in the black residential areas of the Cape’; the histories and editorial policies of a number of ‘South African literary magazines’, including Bolt (1970–5), Classic (1963–71), Contrast (1960–), Izwi (1971–4), New Classic (1975–8), New Coin (1965–), Ophir (1967–76), Purple Renoster (1956–72) and Staffrider (1978–93). In addition, he suggested they might consider which ‘works by black South African writers’ the apartheid censors ‘tended to proscribe’ and which ones they ‘let through’; the ‘origin and development of the Heinemann African Writers series’; and, given the emphasis on South and West African contexts, he suggested that students might ‘compare and contrast Onitsha market literature with the South African fotoroman [photo-novel] in terms of themes and readership’.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2012

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References

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