Torn between Islam and the other: South African novelists on cross‐cultural relationships*

Abstract

Summary In this essay the depiction of intimate relationships between Muslim and non‐Muslim is analysed and discussed with reference to some present‐day South African novels. The work of internationally known authors Achmat Dangor and Elsa Joubert, as well as that of the less‐established but now prize‐winning Rayda Jacobs, can be studied as portrayals of the personal and political conflicts ensuing from the relationships between people of opposing religions and cultures. Emotional and social insecurities, and the individual unease within a restrictive group environment, are recurring themes. All three writers portray their characters as part of a fragmented and hybrid society; one in which racial, cultural and religious diversity coexists warily. The concepts of “self and “other” in this ambivalent post‐colonial world are experienced as changing, uncertain and contradictory entities. The three authors can each be regarded as a representative of a different society, but together they are also voices contributing to the same discourse. The historical reality of the Muslim in Africa ‐ whether as slave, trader, political activist or religious outsider‐ is translated into fictions where the brittle personal relationships also point to larger issues of rootlessness, multicultural relationships and the search for personal identity.