Es’kia Mphahlele , 1919 - 2008

Es’kia Mphahlele [Mphahlele] (December 17, 1919–October 27, 2008) a short-story, an essayist writer, novelist, and teacher, was born on Dec. 17 1919 in Marabastad, South Africa. His father was a messenger and his mother a housemaid, all, working under whites (a reality in most of his stories). He did secondary education in Pretoria (St Peter’s Secondary) and teacher training in Natal (Adams Teachers Training College). He was an avid reader and an anti-apartheid fighter. Due to his oppositional stance, the government banned him from stepping on the South African soil. He lived in Kenya and USA and twenty years after, the government grated him permission to return from exile. He was editor of the fiction magazine Drum Magazine (1955–57), Soyinka’s periodical Black Orpheus (1960–64), Periodical Africa Today (1967) and a holder of different academic and cultural posts in the United States of America, Nigeria and Kenya. His major publications include The African Image (1962), Voices in the Whirlwind (1972) Anthology of Modern African Stories (1964), African Writing Today (1967), In Corner B (Mrs Plum included in the collection) (1967), The Unbroken Song (1981), and Renewal Time (1988), The Wanderers (1971), Chirundu (1979), Afrika My Music (1984), Es’kia (2002), and Es’kia Continued (2005).

Source: 

The biodata has been written based on the information available on the book cover.

Bio prepared by Divine Che Neba, University of Yaoundé 1, nebankiwang@yahoo.com and Chester Mbangchia, University of Yaoundé 1, mbagchia25@mail.com

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