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Apartheid in effect
Apartheid in South Africa began in 1948 and ended in 1991. However, the tight control the government held began before the official enactment of apartheid. In 1931, the Union of South Africa set up a Board of Censors under the Entertainments Act. Originally they controlled only film, but in 1934, they began to censor imported books and periodicals. This setup existed through the 1940s and 1950s, and in 1954, a Commission of Inquiry into "Undesirable Publications" was launched. -
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Publications Commission
An initiative created to review the regulation of books. -
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Cronje Commission
Under Geoffrey Cronje, the Publications Commission was to find the "most effective means of combating...the evil of indecent, offensive or harmful literature" (McDonald, p. 23). It recommended pre-publication censorship, an enforcement agency for the regulation of local and imported books, and the licensing of all printers, publishers, booksellers, and periodicals, as well as a government-appointed Board to hear appeals. -
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Under the Publications Commission, even classic literature was banned. Frankenstein was reportedly called "indecent, objectionable, or obscene." Shelley's story of Victor Frankenstein creating life, however horrible-looking it may be, gives humanity to something that should be seen as other. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell was also banned at one time. The Commission blamed the influx of Western magazines and literature for an alleged rapid decline of the country's culture (McDonald, p. 25). -
And a Threefold Cord by Alex La Guma
Not only was La Guma's writing banned, but he was also silenced by the Suppression of Communism Act. And a Threefold Cord tells the story of a community of people living in shacks. Instead of focusing heavily on the powers that create their living situation, La Guma focuses on the small joys, victories, and tragedies of the poor, heaping humanity on them and shining a light on the inhumanity of apartheid as a system. -
Looking on Darkness by Andre Brink
The first Afrikaans book to be banned by the apartheid government, Looking on Darkness follows a black actor on death row for the murder of his white lover. Brink explores how apartheid has seeped into even the most intimate moments of their people's lives. Brink also advocated that Afrikaans writers should produce "really contestatory work" because "the Afrikaans writer still has just a small chance of being published, ironically because he is part of the power-group" (McDonald, p. 259). -
Burger's Daughter by Nadine Gorimer
While three of Gordimer's novels were banned for varying lengths of time, Burger's Daughter stands out because of Gordimer's focus: a white woman in South Africa struggling with the guilt and repercussions of unearned privilege and how she tries to reconcile a world of injustice. McDonald quotes Gordimer as saying, "my novels are anti-apartheid...not because of my personal abhorrence of apartheid," but because, "If you write honestly about life in South Africa, apartheid damns itself" (p. 220). -
Amandla by Miriam Tiali
Tlali was the first black woman to publish a novel in South Africa. While there are several novels that recount the events of the 1976 student uprisings in Soweto, Tlali's Amandla is arguably the best because of her skill at weaving the intricacies of family life and concerns with the political upheaval going on around them, humanizing their concerns. It is cited as being banned because of the frequent political conversations between the characters (McDonald, p. 340).
