 | You can helpexpand this article with text translated fromthe corresponding article in Afrikaans. (February 2024)Click [show] for important translation instructions.
|
Breyten Breytenbach | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Breytenbach in 1995 | |
| Born | (1939-09-16)16 September 1939 Bonnievale,Cape Province,Union of South Africa |
| Died | 24 November 2024(2024-11-24) (aged 85) Paris, France |
| Occupation |
|
| Language | Afrikaans, English |
| Citizenship |
|
| Alma mater | University of Cape Town |
| Literary movement | Sestigers |
| Notable awards | |
| Spouse | Yolande |
| Relatives | Jan Breytenbach (brother) Cloete Breytenbach (brother) |
Breyten Breytenbach (Afrikaans pronunciation:[ˈbrəitənˈbrəitənbaχ]; 16 September 1939 – 24 November 2024) was a South African writer, poet, and painter. He became internationally well-known as adissident poet and vocal critic ofSouth Africa under apartheid, and as apolitical prisoner of theNational Party–led South African Government. He was also known as a founding member of theSestigers, a dissident literary movement, and was one of the most important poets inAfrikaans literature.
Breyten Breytenbach was born on 16 September 1939 inBonnievale, South Africa.[1]
For secondary education, he attended Hoërskool Hugenote, inWellington, Western Cape. He later attended theUniversity of Cape Town,[1] studyingfine arts at theMichaelis School of Fine Art[2][3] as well asphilology.[4]
Breytenbach was apolitical dissenter against the rulingNational Party and itswhite supremacist policy ofapartheid in the early 1960s. He was a founding member of theSestigers, a dissident literary movement ofAfrikaner writers,[3] in 1961, and participated in protests against the exclusion of black youth from educational pathways.[4]
He left South Africa and lived in Europe andLondon for some time.[5] InParis, France, he married a French woman of Vietnamese ancestry, Yolande, as a result of which he was not allowed to return. The then applicableProhibition of Mixed Marriages Act of 1949 andImmorality Act (1950) made it a criminal offence for a person to have any sexual relations with a person of a differentrace.[1] However, in 1973, a special visa was granted to the couple to allow them to travel to South Africa for a writers' congress at the University of Cape Town.[6]
Breytenbach was involved in the anti-apartheid movement throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, and joined the international organisation Okhela (meaning "spark"). He spoke out against the policy of apartheid at writers' forums and United Nations conferences.[4]
.jpg)
After travelling to South Africa in 1975 on a false passport with the intention of helping black Africans organisetrade unions, and to recruit members of Okhela,[4] he was arrested. At his trial at theSupreme Court inPretoria after being charged under theTerrorism Act 1967, he pleaded guilty to entering South Africa to start a branch of Okhela, which was intended to be a branch of theAfrican National Congress (ANC) for white people. He was sentenced to nine years' imprisonment forhigh treason,[1] the first two insolitary confinement.[4] According toAndré Brink, Breytenbach was retried in June 1977 on new and fanciful charges that, among other things, he had planned a submarine attack by theSoviet Navy on theRobben Island prison through the Okhela. In the end, the judge found him guilty only of having smuggled letters and poems out of jail, for which he was fined $50.[7] He was not physically assaulted, but the prison officials abused him verbally, taunted him by pointing out the censorship of letters from his mother, and allowed him no privacy to mourn her death.[8] While in prison, he wroteMouroir: Mirror Notes of a Novel (published after his release, in 1983).[4] He revisited his prison experiences inThe True Confessions of an Albino Terrorist (1984), in which neither the narrator nor his confessor are given stable identities.[9]
He served seven years[10][6] and was released in December 1982 as a result of international protests[1][4] and the intervention of the French presidentFrançois Mitterrand.[5] Breytenbach returned to Paris, where he remained for the rest of his life, after obtaining French citizenship.[1][4]
In December 1993, he visited the "new South Africa", and continued to travel there regularly,[11] as well as spending time in the United States and Europe.[1] He continued to be "a critical observer and commentator on South African political and social issues".[4] He became a vocal critic ofNelson Mandela's government, and said that the ANC had turned into a "corrupt organisation".[5]
Afterfree elections toppled the ruling National Party and ended apartheid in 1994, Breytenbach became a visiting professor at theUniversity of Cape Town in the Graduate School of Humanities in January 2000.[12]
He was a founding member and served as executive director of theGorée Institute inDakar, Senegal. This arose from an historic meeting in 1987 that became known as theDakar Conference, between exiled leaders of the ANC and a group of liberal South Africans, mostly Afrikaners, from all walks of life. This gathering, held to define a strategy for effective struggle against the apartheid regime, was one of many that opened the way for a negotiated end to apartheid in South Africa.[13] A good friend of Breytenbach,Frederik van Zyl Slabbert, also attended.[10] Breytenbach later taught classes at the institute.[1]
He also campaigned against other injustices in the world. He wrote an open letter inThe Guardian toAriel Sharon,Prime Minister of Israel, in 2002, saying that Israel was committing crimes against the Palestinians, and "A viable state cannot be built on the expulsion of another people who have as much claim to that territory as you have".[5]
Breytenbach wrote poetry, novels, plays, and essays, mostly in Afrikaans. Many of his works have been translated into multiple languages.[6]
His first published work wasDie Ysterkoei Moet Sweet ("The Iron Cow Must Sweat") in 1964. It was regarded as groundbreaking in Afrikaans poetry, presenting "powerful and startling ideas ... without the use of traditional rhythmic metres and attractive images".[1][14]
While in Paris, Breytenbach wrote several works about his experience as an immigrant. His work was at the time controversial in South Africa. His bookSkryt. Om 'n sinkende skip blou te verf (Scrit. Painting Blue a Sinking Ship), published in the Netherlands in 1972, was dedicated "to the people of South Africa, denied citizenship in their own country". The book was banned from sale in South Africa.[4]
During his imprisonment, Breytenbach wrote five volumes of poetry and English prose.[1] His prison writings included the poem "Ballade van ontroue bemindes" ("Ballade of Unfaithful Lovers"). Inspired byFrançois Villon's 15th-century "Ballade des Dames du Temps Jadis", Breytenbach compared Afrikaner dissidentsPeter Blum,Ingrid Jonker, and himself to unfaithful lovers, who had betrayedAfrikaans poetry by taking leave of it.[15]
In 1984, he publishedThe True Confessions of an Albino Terrorist.[16]
Breytenbach was also known for his paintings, which have been exhibited internationally in Amsterdam,[9] Paris, New York City,Stockholm, andHong Kong.[3] The works are oftensurreal in nature, featuring animal and human figures in captivity.[1] He was inspired byFrancisco Goya andHieronymus Bosch.[4]
In October to November 2018, a solo exhibition of his recent work, along with some older works, entitledThe 81 ways of letting go a late self, was held at the Stevenson Gallery inCape Town.[17]
In January 2000, Breytenbach started a three-year stint as visiting professor in the departments of English and Drama in the Graduate School of Humanities at the University of Cape Town.[1]
He also taught at theUniversity of Natal,Princeton University, and in the Graduate Creative Writing Program atNew York University.[18] He was Global Distinguished Professor at NYU for over ten years.[4]
In 2013, Breytenbach became the curator of the Poetry Festival inStellenbosch, near Cape Town.[4]
In 1962, Breytenbach met and married the daughter of theSouth Vietnamese ambassador to France, Yolande Ngo Thi Hoang Lien.[4] She was born in Vietnam and raised in France,[11] and carried French citizenship.[1] He had a daughter, Daphnée, and two grandsons.[2] He also held Frenchcitizenship.[5] He practisedZen Buddhism.[4]
In an interview withThe New York Times in May 1983, Breytenbach said: "I'd never reject Afrikaans as a language, but I reject it as part of theAfrikaner political identity. I no longer consider myself an Afrikaner".[5][8]
Breytenbach died after a fall in Paris, France, on 24 November 2024, at the age of 85.[19][20][2] His wife Yolande was by his side.[2][21]
He was the younger brother ofJan Breytenbach (1932 – 16 June 2024), anSADF commander with political views strongly opposed to his, and Cloete Breytenbach (1933–2019), a widely publishedwar correspondent.[22][23] Cloete was notably one of the few people given permission by South African Prime MinisterJohn Vorster to take photographs of Nelson Mandela atRobben Island following his imprisonment there in July 1964.[24][25][26]
Breytenbach was informally considered byAfrikaans-speakers as theirpoet laureate and was one of the most important living poets inAfrikaans literature.[27][10]
One of the jurors for the 2017Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Award, German writer, publisher, and translatorMichael Krüger, wrote: "Breytenbach is without question the most gifted and most productive poet of White-Africa's literature ... His works as a poet and as a painter are now acknowledged as outstanding in understanding our modern world".[4]
Breytenbach is mentioned by name as the only exception in the satirical Apartheid-eraSpitting Image song "I've Never Met a Nice South African".[37]
The Basque rock band Berri Txarrak dedicated the song "Breyten" to him on their 2005 albumJaio.Musika.Hil.[38]
Breytenbach's work includes numerous volumes of novels, poetry and essays, many of which are inAfrikaans. Many have been translated from Afrikaans to English, and many were originally published in English. Exhibitions of his paintings and prints have been shown in cities around the world.[39]
His works have been translated into many languages, including English, Dutch, German, French, Arabic, Polish, Danish, Basque, Swedish, Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian.[6]
