Biografiese geskiedskrywing: ’n Rekenskap

In this article – held as a lecture in September 2004 at the bi-annual congress of the Afrikaanse Letterkunde-Vereniging at Potchefstroom – the author gives a brief historical and theoretical orientation of the “business” of literary biography. He points out that the “appetite for gossip” in the past led to the view of the biographer as a sort of superior journalist in search of sensation, ignored both by social historians with larger concerns and literary critics who concentrated on the “printed page”, with no interest in the author behind the text. With the emergence of a new kind of life-history, based on the scrutiny of documents and an empirical method, the status of biography changed. For reasons deeply hidden in the social and cultural history of our time, the reading public became more interested in the lives of authors, probably because the inner life of a struggling individual was as fascinating as that of a general on the battlefield. After a survey of the small number of literary biographies in Afrikaans, the author outlines briefly why he writes biographies and why he decided on the writers who attracted him: strong creative forces, men of intellectual abilities and especially of unimpeachable integrity

“Opdrag”: Inleiding of afskeid?

“Opdrag” [“Dedication”], the introductory poem of N. P. van Wyk Louw’s volume Die halwe kring [“The half circle”] of 1937, was in the past seen by critics as one of the texts in which the poet expressed some views on the task of the verbal artist. The question, however, is to which stage in his development the words “min, maar suiwer woorde” in the third stanza refer to: to the poems in Die halwe kring or to a future phase in his work as a poet, represented by his epic poem Raka (1941) and his volume Gestaltes en diere (1942). By introducing certain biographical details and the evidence from the manuscript, kept at the University Library at Stellenbosch, in the discussion, the text, apart from being a poem on the task of the poet, becomes an intense personal document which is the result of a human being’s life: his sorrow and distress as well as his joy and exultation

C Louis Leipoldt and his sexual orientation

The original publication is available at http://www.samj.org.za[No abstract available]Publisher’s versio

Die stand van die Afrikaanse edisiewetenskap: 'n Bestekopname en 'n persoonlike rekenskap

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"Nog eenmaal wil ek in die skemeraand" - Enkele kanttekeninge by die geboorte van 'n gedig

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Degenaar: w??relde en heelalle.

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"Vir elke daad is daar 'n tyd". C.J. Langenhoven, Etinne Leroux en die taak en visie van die skrywer

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Hete kole op 'n amper koue vuurherd

In this article - the text of the annual P.J. Nienaber Memorial Lecture which was held at Stellenbosch on 11th March 2004 - the author mentions the important bibliographies and lists of sources which Nienaber published and which served as the necessary data and preliminary spadework for the writing of a history of Afrikaans literature. He outlines the main task of the literary historian and refers to the controversy that arose after the publication of his own work in the 1980s. He mentions other publications in the field of literary history, including Michael Chapman's Southern African Literatures, and in conclusion formulates his own vision of what a history of literature ought to be

Hete kole op 'n amper koue vuurherd

Lettere En WysbegeerteAfrikaans En NederlandsPlease help us populate SUNScholar with the post print version of this article. It can be e-mailed to: [email protected]