For 40 years, between 1900 and 1939, John Solilo (1864-1940) was a prolific contributor to Xhosa-language newspapers under his own name and under the pseudonyms Mde-ngelimi (Master Wordsmith) and Kwanguye (It's Still Him). He submitted letters and articles on a variety of issues, local news reports from Cradock and Uitenhage, and a considerable body of poetry. Solilo's major literary contribution was his collection of poems entitled Izala, published in 1925, the earliest volume of poetry by a single author in the history of Xhosa literature. His poetry was inspired by umoya wembongi, the...

William Wellington Gqoba (1840-1888) was prominent among the African intellectuals emerging in the Eastern Cape region of South Africa towards the end of the 19th century. By trade, he was a wagon maker, licensed preacher of the Free Church of Scotland, teacher, historian, poet, folklorist, and editor. For much of his brief life, he served at mission stations as a catechist, and he ended his career as editor of the Lovedale newspaper Isigidimi sama-Xosa, to which he contrived to contribute subversive poetry that was outspokenly critical of Western education, the European administration of...

David Livingstone Phakamile Yali-Manisi (1926-1999) was a Thembu imbongi, the most powerful exponent of the art of praise poetry in the Xhosa language in the second half of the 20th century. His literary career, however, was blighted by circumstances beyond his control, and he died in total obscurity. Manisi was obliged to seek his audiences throughout the lifetime of South Africa's reviled policy of apartheid; and, the poet's reputation, initially full of promise, waned as a consequence. He was a lifelong supporter of Nelson Mandela and the author of the earliest poem in praise of Mandela...

Samuel Edward Krune Mqhayi (1875-1945) was the most prominent South African imbongi of his day, a Xhosa oral poet who declaimed his impromptu poetry on occasions of significance to his people. The author of numerous works of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, biography, autobiography, and translation, Mqhayi's contributions to Xhosa-language newspapers remains unparalleled in scope and volume. This book reclaims and assembles a chronological sequence of Mqhayi's occasional poems, for the most part now unknown. Sixty poems celebrate significant events in the calendar, on occasions of national or...

The Xhosa-speaking peoples who settled along the south-eastern seaboard of South Africa promoted traditions of praise poetry (izibongo), poetry produced orally by men and women, adults and children, about people, clans, ancestors and animals. Throughout the nineteenth century, authors who used the Xhosa language gradually developed the craft of composing poetry for publication in newspapers, and expanded this process in the twentieth century, when books containing secular literature appeared, but the practice of oral poetry persists, flourishing now as it did before the incursion of colonial...