Today in History: Sol Plaatje died; Eight of his most profound quotes
Sol Plaatje was a legendary South African writer and politician in his time.
As an activist and politician, Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje spent much of his life engaged in the struggle for the enfranchisement and liberation of African people.
Plaatje was one of the founding members and the first General Secretary of the South African Native National Congress (SANNC), which would become the African National Congress (ANC) a decade later.
As a member of an SANNC deputation, he travelled to England to protest the Natives Land Act of 1913, and later went to Canada and the United States where he met Marcus Garvey and W. E. B. Du Bois.
While he grew up speaking the Tswana language, Plaatje would become a polyglot.
Fluent in at least seven languages, he worked as a court interpreter during the Siege of Mafeking (as it was known then), and translated works of William Shakespeare into Tswana.
His talent for language would lead to a career in journalism and writing wherein he was editor and part-owner of the Mafeking-based Koranta ea Becoana (Bechuana Gazette), and the Kimberley-based Tsala ea Becoana (Bechuana Friend) and Tsala ea Batho (The Friend of the People).
Plaatje was also the first black South African to write an English novel, entitled Mhudi. He wrote the novel in 1919, but it was only published in 1930.
In 1928, Zulu writer R. R. R. Dhlomo published an English-language novel, entitled An African Tragedy, at the missionary Lovedale Press, in Alice.
This makes Dhlomo’s novel the first published black South African novel in English, even though Plaatje’s Mhudi had been written first.
Plaatje also wrote Native Life in South Africa, which Neil Parsons described as “one of the most remarkable books on Africa by one of the continent’s most remarkable writers”, as well as Boer War Diary that was first published 40 years after his death.
He died of pneumonia in Pimville, Johannesburg on 19 June, 1932, and was buried in Kimberley. Over 1 000 people attended the funeral.
With such a profound career in literature, Plaatje was sure to have left a profound quote here and there. In light of this, we have put together a list of what we think are eight of his most profound quotes from his book, Mhudi.
1. “Let the enemy try conclusions with me and the vultures shall gorge themselves with his flesh and the ants shall fatten on his blood.” [page 137]
2. “I am going to leave this place while the leaving is good.” [page 139]
3. “So long as there are two men left on earth there will be war.” [page 169]
4. “Urge him, even as I would urge all men of my acquaintance, to gather more sense and cease warring against their kind.” [page 170]
5. “A hasty dog always burns his mouth.” [page 192]
6. “The viewpoint of the ruler is not always the viewpoint of the ruled.” [page 70]
7. “Lightning fire is quenched by other fire.” [page 102]
8. “Strange to relate, these simple folk were perfectly happy without money and without silver watches. Abject poverty was practically unknown; they had no orphanages because there were no nameless babies.” [page 3]
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