FROM DISSONANCE AND PROPHECY TO NIHILISM AND BLAME: A LOOK AT THE WORK OF MODISANE IN THE CONTEXT OF BLACK SOUTH AFRICAN WRITING

Abstract

Conversion is simply defined 'as a change' in the 'universe of discourse' which is 'observable in the rhetoric of converts'.1 An important aspect of this change is the reconstruction of both, worldview and autobiography. It is a conversion-within-a-con version because personal conversions of black writers took place within the larger literary conversion of the body of black South African writing. The process of personal conversion was marked by crises experiences which were described in the literature as dissonance. For the sake of brevity only some Black authors are discussed. Thus Sol Plaatje, a pluralist with solid roots in several traditions, represents the transition from a steady state, to use Anthony Wallace's terminology,2 to a period of increased individual stress. The eclectic, H.I.E. Dhlomo, marks the stage of cultural distortion which he furthers but also seeks to revitalize with his rhetoric of 'progress' and 'political participation'.3 Finally, the prime focus of this paper is William 'Bloke' Modisane. His rhetoric of blame and nihilism marked a new, one hopes merely temporary, steady state. All Black South African literature, but especially that of Bloke Modisane, represent a genre in which worldview, fantasy and personal biography are freely mixed so that Modisane's autobiography is a mythology of blame.