1The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) is a significant milestone in contemporary South African history. It was set up in December 1995 to provide for the investigation and disclosure of gross violations of human rights committed essentially under the apartheid regime: starting from March 1960 with the Sharpeville massacre, it also finally covered the violent ‘transition’ years that would lead to the first multiracial, democratic elections of 1994. As the TRC’s Chairman Archbishop Desmond Tutu put it, the intention was ‘to hear the truth for the sake, not of prosecution, but of reconciliation’ and thus attempt some sort of healing of South Africa’s wounds, building bridges between the different racial and ethnic communities and enable this young democracy to forge a whole new identity for itself.

2The first hearings began in April 1996 and from the start the TRC recognised the importance of publicity and mass broadcasting, reaching out to as many people as possible both inside and outside the country. It also understood the potential of the new technology coming online at the time and was one of the first to create a worldwide website for itself which it used on a daily basis to publish the transcripts of these hearings.

3I remember following these stories, first those of the victims of murder, torture and rape and then of the perpetrators of this same brutality. It was a bleak experience, and I was only an outsider. There was little mediation; the reader had to cope alone with these harrowing tales and the emotions that came in their train–incomprehension and outrage, disgust and anger, particularly when faced with the politicians’ testimonies–those who gave their orders orally without getting their hands dirty and who were now giving a minimalist account of their ‘truth’, angling to get off the hook of guilt. Nevertheless it was fascinating to read these stories as they unfolded on a computer screen, although this was then followed by hours spent coaxing a noisy and erratic printer into keeping a trace of this History in the making.1

Country of My Skull: A New Form of Historiography?

4It was only in 2001 that I came across the work of Antjie Krog who had been following the hearings of the TRC for the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) as a radio journalist. She then related these experiences in her book Country of My Skull.2

5Like the TRC itself, this work is also a remarkable landmark–but one which is difficult to qualify and compartmentalise. A comment on the cover taken from the Observer declares: ‘Whatever it is that makes a major lasting work of non-fiction, it is here.’ Yet it is a work of non-fiction that contains fictional elements and the book is frequently and wrongly described as being a novel. When given the opportunity to interview Antjie Krog3 I asked her about this and she made no bones about the fictitious elements and the characters that she had created. This she did for clearly defined reasons as for the impact and speed of her narration for example:

Sometimes things have been said by a wide variety of people but to bring in someone just for one important sentence that he said– describe that day, that particular moment that circumstance that has actually nothing to do with the story, but made him refer to something that you feel is worth linking there, makes it a messy fabric. So you would then take the words of that person and give that to another person. So in both Country of My Skull and Change of Tongue I have more than one character that is completely fictional, and... I give them most of the things I have picked up elsewhere.
(See interview: 262-263)

6She may also re-arrange her account for ethical, rather than technical reasons. This she does for her three brothers that she condenses into two, thereby streamlining the narrative fabric and also making it impossible to identify which of the three brothers actually made these remarks, some of which are racist in content (See interview: 263). However whenever she uses a person’s real name then she says she will report that person’s actions and words as faithfully as possible. She also admits to being ruthless in her reporting and declares that at the end of the day her real loyalty is to her text. She has used stories told to her by friends in confidence (though here again she takes the precaution of changing names and geographical locations) (See interview: 263). Likewise in her poetry she feels there is no topic that should be taboo: township toilets, menstruation, menopause, farting and incontinence may all be grist to the writer’s mill (See interview: 266). Yet she is conscious that there can never be one immutable ‘truth’ or ‘reality’. And for her this is the case for any experience once it is expressed in words:

I think the moment that something is in words it is already a transformation from reality–so it’s already different from what it really is, because you are already selecting by choosing words and... making an abstract of the reality... The moment that you start writing you are sifting, you are choosing to write particular things down and you are losing particular things–so that’s a further streamlining of the truth and of reality. So in many ways for me the fact that I am trying to find words is already in the realm of fiction in one way. (See interview: 262)

7Antjie Krog constantly reflects on the methodological difficulties of documenting such a tumultuous and traumatic national event as the TRC, and the reader is frequently made party to the choices made and the paths not taken. The reader therefore has the impression that this narration of history is not handed out in a pre-packaged linear form, so usual in historiography, when she is implicitly expected to trust the historian and his choices.

8If healing and reconciliation is to take place, then all of the components of the South African mosaic, particularly the white communities, must be brought in to the TRC process and made to feel implicated. Yet many white communities (both English and Afrikaans speaking) continued to live parallel lives, ignoring the TRC and feeling totally unconcerned by its work. This Krog portrays vividly:

By late morning a cricket match commences on the field next to the hall. And it is clear that the more things change on this side of the Soutpansberg, the more they stay the same. While the Commission listens to testimony of human rights violations, cheerful white families with their Tupperware, their sunhats and their small-town familiarity spend the day picnicking on the grass outside. Their children chase each other around the bakkies. Caught between the field and the hall, we in the media sit listening to bitter crying and choked words, interspersed with cheering and applause from an enthusiastic cricket crowd. The division carries through to the policemen patrolling the showgrounds. The white policemen loll about, watching cricket, while their black colleagues stand solemnly in the doorways of the hall listening to the testimony. My hands on the laptop keyboard are numb with contradiction.
(Krog 1999: 296-297)

9From early on Krog had identified what ‘the stumbling blocks’ for the TRC would be. When the newspapers devoted a special page to the testimonies she said it was the page that no one wanted to advertise on, precisely because that was the page that readers skipped. Similarly with the television coverage of the victims’ hearings some Whites refused to watch, calling the TRC the ‘Crying and Lying Commission’, believing it to be a sham and that the victims were exaggerating and only crying crocodile tears. Thus her first objective was simply to get white South Africans to follow these proceedings, believing that if they did so, they could not fail to be convinced by the ‘unbelievable integrity’ of the victims (Interview: 267).

10Yet although she knew just how difficult it was to get white South Africans to read the transcripts of the hearings–or to follow them live on the radio or TV–nevertheless the initial layout of her book followed traditional research conventions, with the testimonies set apart in a different font, with the name, the date and the violation stated at the top, making it crystal clear that this was the transcription of a testimony and not her writing. The first reader she gave the manuscript to, said he had read it quickly and had skipped the testimonies–precisely what Krog had wanted to avoid. So the final version that we have today is an inter-weaving and crisscrossing of the testimonies with other personal stories and comments as Krog moves in and out of the transcription of the hearings. For many white people in South Africa she believes that the TRC–like the new political order itself–is ‘foreign territory and you don’t know where you are going’, so the intermingling with other personal narrations and reflections enables them to ‘piggy-back in’ (interview: 269) to the process. Thus she weaves individual stories and histories into the grander picture of the History of the Nation: the big picture is interspersed with minute, personal detail and the reader is made privy to the intimate and domestic lives of the community surrounding the TRC and its hearings: Krog and her family, the journalists, the commissioners and society beyond. In so doing, Krog analyses and explains the emotions that such testimonies may unleash. She gives her feelings, those of others, as well as the insights provided by the experts brought in by the TRC itself:

a psychologist that I interviewed suggested to me that it is hard to listen to suffering... If you listen to suffering you have to respond. If you listen to horror, or to the perpetrators’ testimony it’s actually thrilling because you can say ‘Oh, you know, I’m not like that’. This pleasing effect that you are not like that... to interact with victim testimony is much harder. So I wanted people to read it... but I also didn’t want people to feel confronted. (Interview: 268)

11Therefore the reader is not left to face these atrocities alone–they are mediated in various ways by Krog.

Poetry and Translation

12Antjie Krog is particularly well known as a poet in Afrikaans, her mother tongue. She first wrote Country of My Skull in Afrikaans and then translated it into English, with the help of her son. The only chapter that she wrote directly in English (because of the publication deadline) was the one about Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, and this was the chapter that she says attracted the most criticism. With hindsight she wonders if she would have written it differently had it first passed through the filter of her mother tongue.

13Krog considers herself first and foremost as a poet and she includes snatches of poetry in Country of My Skull. She sets out to ‘seize the surge of language by its soft, bare skull’ (Krog 1999: 39) and uses the techniques of poetry to relate events or call up the immediacy of emotions–translating them into the ‘vapour of freshly mown language’ (Krog 1999: 70-71), giving the words the sensorial impact of newly cut grass.

14Indeed the question of translation is another leitmotif of the book: not only the difficulties of translating reality into words, but more prosaically translating one language into another. The TRC had to accommodate witnesses in practically all of the eleven official languages of South Africa–plus Polish.4 The difficulty of translation is a methodological question which is raised early on by the journalists who are to cover the TRC. Did all of South Africa’s eleven official languages have the words needed to cover the Commission? Krog reports the anger of a Zulu colleague who declares that if the words do not exist already in a language, then they will just have to create them and he provides a list of examples in Zulu such as: serial killer: umbulali onequngu = addicted killer; politics: ezombusazwe = matters about the ruling of the land; right-winger: untamo-lukhani = stiff-necked (Krog 1999: 21). For Krog too the richness of these languages is important and she constantly reflects on the necessity of their translation and explanation: you can, she believes, learn about yourself by finding out and translating the perceptions of others. She quotes Professor Mayekiso who declares that the original inhabitants of Southern Africa started gauging the nature of white people as they arrived and started to call them ‘They-whospeak-to-others-as-if-they-are-bundles-of-washing’.5 Indeed in the black South African languages a person is assessed and defined by the names he collects throughout his life according to how he is judged by others–and these names then tell the story of that life.

15Krog’s translation of reality into words is often elliptical and the reader at times is only given shards of memory and fragmented experience–imitating life itself. The reader thus has to participate actively, trying to piece together the various disjointed elements. Like the echo of that recorded comment: ‘I saw the severed hand of a black activist in a bottle at a Port Elizabeth police station. The police told me it was a baboon’s hand. They said to me: ‘Look here, this is the bottled hand of a Communist’ (Krog 1999: 47) Words reminiscent too of Sara Baartman, the ‘Hottentot Venus’ whose remains had been preserved and exhibited at the Musée de l’homme in Paris6.

16Some events remain without clear explanation or final interpretation and the reader must content herself with supposition and make up her own mind. Such is the case with Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. Before her appearance finally at the TRC Krog gives us samples from the patchwork of perception about her: Winnie as a backbencher, Winnie as a past-master of non-verbal communication, Winnie as trashy tabloid, Winnie as pre-and-post-feminist-figurehead, Winnie as Lady Macbeth...

17Krog admits that like many Whites, she still has difficulty coming to terms with this ‘Mother of the Nation’ and her particular form of cruelty. She also finds it terrifying that Winnie ‘turns out spectacularly dressed and with smart cars at squatter camps and that people have no problem with it.’ (Interview: 272)

Healing Wounds?

18The South African Constitution that was signed by Nelson Mandela in 1996 is a remarkable document, and a clear declaration of intent of the country to become a non racist, non sexist democracy. Yet a lot remains to be done–not least in changing mindsets carved out by centuries of racism and sexism. Again Krog sums this up well with her use of anecdote and tell-tale detail–the macrocosm reflected once more in the microcosm:

We were invited to Chile and a delegation from government went to talk about the post Truth Commission. Now I was there with some black intellectuals and the people from the government, from the army and so forth. And that morning we went into the venue where the whole thing was held and there was a big table in the middle and there were six chairs around the table and around the walls were other chairs. I sat down and when I looked I saw that my two black colleagues were sitting next to me and I looked and I saw that the Whites that came with us, the white men were sitting around the table, so I asked my two black colleagues what made them think that the middle chairs are for them and what makes us think that the wall chairs are for us? (Interview: 273)

19Clearly there is still a long way to go but the TRC, like the Constitution, has been one of the building blocks of this new nation. Contrary to Chile, whose Truth Commission was held behind closed doors, South Africa made the conscious and deliberate choice of public hearings, and by telling their stories and having them recognised by the nation as the ‘truth’, some victims have indeed been able to find some kind of peace and closure. This public telling is also essential as ‘there is no way that you can begin to imagine the language, the rhythm, the imagery of the original stories’ (Krog 1999: 360). And it is these stories that are subsequently inscribed as part of the country’s official past. Below is one such poignant story (which also adds another facet to the prism of ‘translation’):

This white man with the red scarf, he shot into the outside bathroom where Sonnyboy was hiding... I was standing in the kitchen... I saw him dragging my child. Sonnyboy was already dead. He was holding him by his legs like a dog. I saw him digging a hole, scraping Sonnyboy’s brains into that hole and closing it with his boot. The sun was bright... but it went dark when I saw him lying there. It’s an everlasting pain. It will never stop in my heart. It always comes back. It eats me apart. Sonnyboy, rest well, my child. I’ve translated you from the dead. (Krog 1999: 42)

20I asked Krog her opinion of the TRC and whether it had achieved reconciliation and fulfilled her expectations. She replied:

No, I think it was burdened with too many expectations–everyone had his own set of expectations. The politicians thought it would get rid of the baggage of the past. The previous government thought it would give everyone amnesty. Many of the victims thought it would give out substantial compensation. I thought it would bring a new moral tone... And it couldn’t do all of that. Many people thought it would bring reconciliation. Others thought it would bring truth. Others thought it would bring justice.... But it can’t be this broad church which in many ways leaves everyone slightly disappointed and some people deeply disappointed. Having said that the fact that it gathered two thousand testimonies that were aired in public, that in itself is enough reason to justify the Commission, I would say. The fact that the rest failed and is messy and is problematic–that may be so, but that part of it alone was, I would say, worth it. (Interview: 276)

Conclusion

21Like people, societies that do not manage to deal adequately with their past often become sick. Right from the start the new South African nation realised this and made a sustained effort to come to terms with her past–and the work of Antjie Krog is inscribed in this attempt.

22Part of the TRC’s work of healing has been to explain the different communities to themselves and to others. Krog similarly addresses her own community and attempts to explain the Afrikaners to themselves. She is aware at all times of her Afrikaner heritage and of the role played by the Afrikaner community in South Africa’s past. Tellingly, she dedicates her work to ‘every victim who had an Afrikaner surname on her lips.’

23There are those who feel she is a traitor to Afrikanerdom, others who dismiss her, saying they have no time for such ‘white guilt trips’. Less emotional criticism has been levelled at her methodology and style, declaring that fictional elements or poetry should have no place in the serious writing of History...

24Nevertheless others feel she has done a huge amount to document South Africa’s past and ‘translate’ South Africans to each other and to the international community with this new and at times destabilising genre. She connects with her readers and accompanies them in ways that make this narration accessible to a large audience–and this must surely contribute, albeit indirectly, to the health of the nation...

25Antjie Krog interviewed by Elaine Kennedy-Dubourdieu, 19th November 2005, at St Nazaire, during the International Literary Festival organised by MEET (la Maison des écrivains étrangers et des traducteurs de Saint-Nazaire).

26Antjie Krog = AK; Elaine Kennedy-Dubourdieu = EKD

27Tape Side One (45’):

EKD: There seems to be confusion over the labelling of your book– my students tend to call it a novel–also at MEET7 they call it a novel too... which it isn’t. How do you qualify it? How do you refer to it?
AK: It’s also a problem for me. In South Africa recently we had a whole conference about reality and fiction and one of the academics did a piece on my work and she mentioned that in interviews it was said to me that I had just published a novel and I didn’t correct the journalist to say ‘No, it’s not a novel’. (Pause) It seemed to me very problematic to make a distinction between what you would call fiction and fact–and I’m not talking about ‘faction’. I think the moment that something is in words it is already a transformation from reality–so it’s already different from what it really is, because you are already selecting by choosing words and making... so, you are making an abstract already of the reality in one way. It’s also– the moment that you start writing you are sifting, you are choosing to write particular things down and you are losing particular things–so that’s a further streamlining of the truth and of reality. So in many ways for me the fact that I am trying to find words is already in the realm of fiction in one way. Then you build the book very much like a novel. You have particular characters. Sometimes things have been said by a wide variety of people but to bring in someone just for one important sentence that he said–describe that day, that particular moment that circumstance that has actually nothing to do with the story but that made him refer to something that you feel is worth linking there, makes it a messy fabric. So you would then take the words of that person and give that to another person. So usually in both Country of My Skull and Change of Tongue I have more than one character that is completely fictional–and most of them are saying... I give them most of the things that I have picked up elsewhere. The moment that I use a person’s real name–that person... you know I wouldn’t move into fiction with that person. But... for example, I have three brothers, but to protect them I made two brothers and no one knows exactly which... because it’s very racist what they are saying... OK so there is a variety of ways that you... sometimes... it’s out of protection. So if people don’t see me with a tape recorder–in other words it’s only afterwards that I realise that this was a very important conversation, an important happening... then I would change the names, because I am also... I know I should go back to them and say ‘May I use A and B of you?’, but at this stage in South Africa things are so sensitive, no one would like to be known as someone who utters racist doubts, you know it’s... that’s how they are. Or you know I’ve always suspected that’s how they are. So in that sense then it’s... I use fictional elements combined with factual information and elements.
EKD: You mention using your family in that way. Is it really a problem to you? D’you feel that you have to protect them in that way? You were mentioning your brothers–or your husband, your children–your family in general... Are there times when you have really kept them out of it... or do you think that more or less–even if you don’t actually attribute it to the right brother–that you’ve put in most of the stuff that you have wanted? Or are there moments when you really have scruples and you say ‘No I’m not going to do that’?
AK: (Pause) One of the... terrible things I often think about a writer is their unscrupleness (sic) (laughter), and in Change of Tongue there is a particular story that was for me–when I was told that by one of my best friends–I only have a few, but she is one of them, I immediately realised that this is... is a transformation story par excellence, I wouldn’t come across anything like that again in my life. And when I . . . initially I thought no, but... you know she told it to me very personally, and she has a family and it will have repercussions so I didn’t use it initially... I knew where I would like to put it in, but I didn’t, and when the book was finished I thought you know what? This book needs that story and that story is just going to slip away and just... die... and I thought, but let me phone her. And I picked up the phone and as I was dialling I was wondering ‘OK what would you do if she is saying no?’ And I put the phone down. And I thought you know, I’m going... I know that already I have made up my mind I am going to use that. And I used that and it had... you know I changed the area, I changed the farm, I made her husband my family... you know I did a lot of changes to protect that but everyone close to her, including... knew, OK this is my story... Ja and she was very angry. Still is, so that’s... that’s you know one of those things. It’s the same with one’s family... my husband I can always say he chose me... and I started to write early enough that he knew he was choosing a writer–now I don’t feel so sorry for him (laughter) but the rest are sort of born with me... and that is... ja. I mean I just take how I hate it when someone... when an event such as this, it is filled with writers and then you often find yourself then in a story somewhere, and I deeply resent that, because it’s not exactly what I said, it’s not in the context, it’s not properly understood and yet I’m doing the same so I think that’s... Margaret Atwood once said ‘we’re like crows, we pick up all shiny pieces and then bring it back to the novel.’
EKD: But when it comes down to it–you know we were talking about scruples–when it comes down to it, you tend to use... there’s not been a moment in your past when you’ve said ‘No I can’t use that’?
AK: I did that once. It was with my third volume. I had a poem that dealt with an abortion and just before I sent it off to the publishers I took it out. I think it could hurt one of my children... and our poet laureate at that stage–very famous, good solid poet who I had enormous respect for–he was sort of the editor of the whole volume and he called me after it was published, into his office and he said where is that poem and I said no, I thought taking it out... and he took my book and just skidded it over the table and said that’s a kind of loyalty that you have, stop writing now... and... I resented that very much. I also did then my Master’s on his work about his personal life to see what he then did about it–and I realised that he didn’t actually write about his family at all, so I don’t know why he was so fierce about me... But afterwards I realised that... where does the loyalty then lie?... It’s more important in a way than, than to say you are not loyal... so for me the loyalty lies to what I am trying to say, and in order to achieve that as best as possible, I would really use and abuse everything. Ja. So it’s your... you have a very clear sense of what it is that you are trying to bring across. Now the problem is to what extent you are trying to bring a lie across... I mean that can be, that I’m saying that South Africa is transforming and in fact it’s not... er, but I’m forcing it... I’m using and I’m transforming things... because it is MY view. But then I believe that the readers will experience it as... unrecognisable for them, as not talking about them and it’s one of the strange things about the... in both Country of My Skull and Change of Tongue–is the amount of... the way people would tell me it’s their life and suddenly now everyone comes from the town that I write about. It seems to me that in every South African’s past that there is a small town somewhere that is changing and that is dying at the same time. Ja, so I... that’s why in many ways for me that I keep on saying that I am a poet... because it’s not that thing there, I don’t know what it is... it’s not that thing there... you don’t have to say what it is... but in conclusion... The publisher of Knupp (?) in New York I heard her last year at a conference of publishing houses in Berlin and she was saying that... they talked about how fiction is no longer selling and how people want to read about real life and she is thinking that writers currently are working towards a new genre... that people are making something new, that afterwards you would not be able to classify it as... because of that, because we want... because life is so... um... present, international life is so present... I’m not interested in what black people fictionalise about South Africa, I want to know what they really are thinking. I want to understand where they are coming from. I want to know how they feel about Whites. I know how they feel about their past, how they tried to overcome apartheid. I’m really not very much interested in... I mean it’s interesting how they fictionalise white women, how they would do that, but for me... that’s why in South Africa particularly non fiction is selling extremely well.
EKD: A question for you as a poet–about what you were saying yesterday, that as a poet everything is grist to your mill–your poem yesterday about toilets in a township–you would stand by that as a poet that there really is nothing that you couldn’t put in your poetry?
AK: Ja, it would make me give up an enormous belief and loyalty... if I found that this can’t be... but it is very interesting... and fortunately that gendered approach is now part of the thinking... but it’s what themes are being respected... and it’s Death, it’s Love, but with a capital, it’s Man, it’s God... but it is never menstruation, it’s never menopause... and if it’s old, if it’s age... I’m publishing a volume in March... the moment that they write about age they move to death, so you don’t write about the disintegration of the body... you howl about death .. which is fine, but it means you don’t deal with farting .. you know incontinence all those things that happen. And when male poets get old they usually have young girl friends and then there is this fantastic contrast, you know this old age that is being pulled up by youth. Ja, how does the love fold through in a marriage of thirty or forty years... how does it sound, or doesn’t it sound? Is there no such thing anymore? And how do we then say that? Ja...
Wilma Boisnard: Can I add something? I thought that was interesting yesterday when you were being translated on that, when you came to the subject of menopause and all that, the translator, obviously slightly embarrassed by using the word and that really struck me...
AK: Now when that specific poem, that that guy read about the township toilet... I went to the Royaumont (?) Foundation and they had the French poet who translates one’s work, and he had to give a reading at the end... and none of the men wanted to read that poem, and they said, you know it’s because they are men and they don’t think they can. And I said, but I read poems by men, you know why can’t you? And then in the end this Rémy, the head of it, he really did... and there was a standing ovation, you know it was as if everyone felt ‘Wow’! (Laughter)
EKD: For the moment anyway in our classes we don’t use your poetry, we use Country of My Skull, and I think that’s what works so well with our students, is the way that all these different things that you deal with–you deal with so openly–you bring them out .. and the students can identify with these things, and also as a reader we feel that we are being accompanied, we’re being taken along, we are not being left on our own... I followed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission over the Internet, as the hearings were coming out there every day on the screen–bald and blank and we are left to cope with it... even though the webmaster Steve was terrific... Whereas what you are doing and what the students really like is the way that you accompany us. You filter, but you also take us along that road .. you explain to us and you tell us what we are feeling... Is there ever a moment when you feel perhaps that you are telling your reader too much? That you are perhaps telling him too much how he should feel, how he should react?
(Silence) We enjoy it, we really appreciate it but...
AK: I haven’t thought of that... and I think that the reason is that right through the reporting part one picked up what the stumbling blocks were. So I picked up that the newspapers had problems with people reading it, because the newspapers decided to devote a page–a special page–to the testimonies. It had its logo– the Truth Commission logo or Truth Commission stories whatever, and that was the page they found that no one wanted to advertise on, because it would imply... implicate you... And no one... and that was the page that people skipped. So you know ‘Oh here’s that...’ so you know, ‘ I’ll read it some other day’. I also found that the people who watched television–the Whites would say the black people were not really crying, they wait until the camera’s on them and then they cry... but it was not... And I was wondering how they can come to that, because you need to listen to not more than three and you would have picked up the, you know, unbelievable integrity in those testimonies. So there were several of these things where I realised people... people are not reading it, they are not accessing it... So it became... initially the book had the name of the perpetrator on top with the date and the violation–and in another font, to say that this is not my text, this is... And then the first reader that we gave the manuscript to said ‘oh I had to read it very quickly and I skipped, you know when it was the testimonies, I skipped them’. And that is precisely what I don’t want. I want people to find themselves within that text, before they can think of ways to escape that. Also during the Truth Commission hearings a psychologist that I interviewed suggested to me that it is hard to listen to suffering... If you listen to suffering you have to respond. If you listen to horror, or to perpetrators’ testimony it’s actually thrilling because you can say ‘Oh, you know, I’m not like that’. This pleasing effect that you are not like that... but that to deal, to interact with victim testimony is much harder. So I wanted people to read it... but I also didn’t want people to feel confronted as if... because that also scared off a lot of people, because (she sings) ‘ja-ja-jer-ja-ja, that’s what you did, that’s not me it’s you-hoo’... because people don’t want to feel implied (Mobile phone rings... Laughter)... so if one talks about loyalty, in the case of ‘Change of Tongue’, my loyalty lied... lay, lied... whatever word, with the testimonies. I wanted people to know what was happening and I wanted people also to know that it’s not unique to feel implicated... and then I usually go to someone and say OK I feel implicated... and then I usually go to someone and I say ‘I feel implicated, what do I do with this?’ Or why do I feel about this–this way about white testimonies... so that the whole spectrum is available for someone... I have never thought that maybe it was too much for someone
EKD: No it isn’t...
AK: No, but maybe... so that my obsession right through it was to get people to read it.
EKD: And to accompany them, and to deal with what they are feeling as they are reading it. We felt that you were sort of holding our hand and taking us and saying ‘well I know you are going to feel like this.’
AK: Yes, because otherwise it seems like... I actually can cope, but I’m telling you, I’m just confronting you... so if you can’t cope it’s your problem, or there is something wrong with you, because I am coping, here is the story, I’m listening, I don’t stop half way and say I can’t take this. (Pause) It’s also... and that’s why the personal element became part of the story, is to piggy-back in... because this is terrain, at least for white people in South Africa, this is foreign territory and you don’t know where you are going, and it helped us at the Commission to have someone like Tutu... and there were a few people in the Commission that you could feed back on, and say I can’t listen to this, I can’t... or what is happening here? Why does this part seem so evil? What... I mean how can black people just do that to one another? So the notion that you can enter unknown territory on the back of someone... on the one hand, and on the other hand it’s also just saying I don’t think this is the absolute truth... this is my view of it.
EKD: Is that why you left the ‘Shepherd’s Tale’ to the end? There is quite a long transcript of what he actually said, which we don’t get, or not often... it’s always interspersed with comment... whereas when we get to the shepherd’s tale, is it because in a sense we’ve got the maturity? We’ve reached adulthood–that we can cope with this on our own? Before you then give us what you sort of class as a commentary? You then give us your commentary, but you have separated the two things–and it comes very late on.
AK: Remember at the end of one chapter, there’s the stories of those who betrayed Yassir Henry8 and Basil Snayer9, when they talk about the killing. That is just given without commentary: ja, Yassir Henry’s big anger about the book was that I just present his destiny without comment and that I deemed the others worthy of comment–that his was just slapped in. And then also I think there is a lot of female testimony that is also just given at the end of another chapter... The shepherd’s tale I did at the end because I did a close reading of it: a) because it was really the last hearing that I heard that... but I found that so unbelievable that a shepherd would... I mean it’s like something Biblical that is happening. We have all kinds of things here but here indeed is a shepherd–it’s so unreal, absolutely unreal... But it was... I . . . that’s what I’m doing now, I’m taking a specific week’s testimonies and I’m giving them close readings, I’m doing that with students and every student chooses one... I think that should be done with everyone, because it’s unbelievable what is coming out, so that was at random actually.
EKD: That’s why I use it in class, because we’ve worked our way through to the end and I tell the students, ‘You look at this, you do it as a commentary’, before we look at your version... Because that’s nice, that’s the way you’ve placed it, we can do it like that...
AK: But you are right, I think that if I did that kind of close reading right at the beginning, one would feel, now really there is still some hundred pages left, do I have to go to do this?
EKD: What you were saying yesterday about Winnie Mandela was very interesting. I didn’t realise this... you said that was the only chapter that you didn’t write in Afrikaans. Why didn’t you?
AK: Because it was one of the last hearings and the manuscript was already completed. The P.W.Botha and the Winnie Mandela hearings were the last hearings. The end was also actually reasonably written–the part about my brothers–not the conclusion with the fight in the Commission and when they went to the Island, that was also around Christmas. But the Winnie Mandela hearing was the last one and I had to get it in, because the manuscript was already with Ivan. And I didn’t have time–my son wasn’t there–and I didn’t have time to first write it in Afrikaans, have it translated, so I wrote it in English. Also because a lot of the reporting that I’ve done on Winnie Mandela, I didn’t do language, so it’s not completely true, some of the... because the reporting is always done first in Afrikaans then the English version is written. But what was new was an analysis of the interaction between her and Tutu and I had two reviews that said that the only weak point in the book... because she was actually NOT saying that she was sorry and I’m giving her a kind reading and it’s you know... it’s not working...
EKD: But didn’t you have that other voice coming in and saying, somebody else was saying ‘no she’s not sorry, she’s just repeating what Tutu said’?
AK: Yes, I think I still stand by that, but I’m wondering if I translate the whole think in Afrikaans whether I wouldn’t agree with the other character... That she actually didn’t...
EKD: She just repeated ..
AK: You know I’ve just now selected a group of testimonies, I want to work on Tarthar (?) on that. And I looked at that, and I mean whatever way you can look at it, she is saying something... there... You know, I . . . but then she says ‘As we are saying things went wrong one totally agrees with that... and the reasons for that’, so you’re not sure whether she is saying she agreeing with the reasons that things went wrong or whether things went wrong.
EKD: But at least he got her to that...
AK: I thought so. Yes, yes and she could have said ‘it’s ludicrous’ you know the way she said to everyone else.
EKD: But you said that was the chapter that was the most criticised ...
AK: Ja, ja
EKD: What about Winnie now? How do you feel about Winnie now, having written all of that about her? With all the years that have gone by... Has she changed in any way do you feel? And what is her political future?
AK: No, I think she is too old now... But it is interesting you know Winnie is like... a big... water divider. When you are white you just have problems with her. Most black people don’t... and you don’t understand why they don’t have problems. That is why that book by Njabulo Ndebele The Cry of Winnie Mandela is the first intelligent attempt to deal with what is Winnie and what do we as black people make of her and with her. Ja, so this is the wonderful thing about South Africa is that you would get a book like that, that would assist you, help you through with that. But every time I have to think, OK what would Njabulo... to help me through with that because my instinctive reaction to her is just that she has (been) destroyed by us... that is so. But it means that she is destroyed, that there is something worth following within her. And I find it terrifying that you know she turns out spectacularly dressed and smart cars at squatter camps and people have no problem with it... But she turns up. The others also have the same cars and the same clothes, but they don’t turn up. And I hear that.
EKD: You say at one point that she is speaking in fact to the constituency of the black, the African Americans–far more addressing them rather than her own people. Is this something that carries on as well? Do you feel that she still has an indirect impact on the United States?
AK: For a very long time... that was one of the big problems. It is changing slightly now, but it’s that the race debate in South Africa is using the jargon of the United States, and you know one kept on saying that the majority of Blacks... you know we have to find our own vocabulary for it... which is not to say that you don’t agree, but we have to find our own words for that. And it’s slowly beginning and we are much more interacting with Africa now recently, than previously, so that is very interesting what is coming from the continent, how they see race, why they do come to South Africa, because there are still Whites... how those refugees there in South Africa see it. And those refugees are writing books now and those books are getting published in South Africa, so there is a whole spate of refugee literature. And they write often far better than... us. And in their books the Whites are often much kinder and much more accepting than the Blacks, so it’s an interesting new tension and it’s fortunately influencing the race issue.
EKD: This is the moment for me to get in my question on my pet topic which is affirmative action. Can I ask you about that? Ask you what your opinion is of affirmative action... or equity, I know that the vocabulary is changing in South Africa. Affirmative action, not quotas. How do you see that?
AK: Explain to me, do you think there is a difference between quota and affirmative action?
EKD: Yes I do.... or certainly in the British context where we have what is called positive action, rather than affirmative action, and it’s not really a question of quotas at all in Britain, it’s a question of opening up training schemes, making it easier for people who might not have thought about careers say in teaching or social work or the police or whatever, in key areas to bring forward these people as candidates–it’s in no way giving them the job, it’s in no way quotas, but it’s putting them in a situation where they can access these jobs. A lot of it goes through training, so there are special training schemes which are limited to certain ethnic groups, bringing them up to a threshold, trying to bring forward more candidates from particular groups where we need more people... do you see that as how it is interpreted in South Africa? Or is it more rigid? More seen in terms of quotas? And where you work in the University of the Western Cape, traditionally a coloured university, now being coloured and black, do you see any point where it might be interesting to accelerate change? In a sense to try to open it up to all ethnic groups perhaps in a quicker way than if you let things just bumble along? Is there a need for active intervention?
AK: I do believe in active intervention. (Pause) I find it a complicated issue; on one hand you want particular people to have access to particular things, to everything. But everything is structured in a particular way to favour a particular group. Now we were invited to Chile and a delegation from government went to talk about the post Truth Commission. Now I was there with some black intellectuals and then people from government, from the army and so on. And that morning we went into the venue where the whole thing was held and there was a big table in the middle and there were six chairs around the table and around the walls were other chairs. I sat down and when I looked I saw that my two black colleagues were sitting next to me and I looked and I saw that the Whites that came with us, the white men were sitting around the table so I asked my two black colleagues what made them think that the middle chairs are for them and what makes us think that the wall chairs are for us? (Laughter) How do we... so although those chairs might also be for us there is this thing that you think... I was on a committee that had to appoint a commission and–we have quota systems–a third of everything must be women–so a third of that commission must be women, so we interviewed fifty people and a third were women. And the women were so bad. They were unbelievably bad. You can only put them on because there is a quota because there is not a single reason why one of them deserved to be on that commission, so I asked two black female colleagues why were they so bad? And they said ja, they are lazy, they don’t study the legislation, they didn’t prepare, they didn’t phone other women to find out what does one have to do and it’s a disgrace and we don’t agree with this whole thing. Then I met someone from New Zealand who was doing a study of women in the workplace–and note that I am answering your question–women in the workplace, she was trying to work out what kind of interview system you must have to find the best women, and she was saying that the way in which people are being interviewed and the interview system is not the proper way in which to find the best women. It’s the proper way to find the best men, but not the best women. So she devised one where you put people in a group and everyone has to tell about his closest to death experience and how excellent the women were, and how you immediately saw which women were the best... and how appalling the men were and how you wouldn’t actually want one of them on your committee. So what I’m saying is I believe in affirmative action... in a way it’s not that you believe in affirmative action, but in a way it changed the tone. The moment that I have a party and there is no black person there... if I close my eyes and I listen I can hear that its a Whites only party, there’s a tone there... which doesn’t make it not a nice party but... The moment that there’s black people, there’s coloured people there, it brings something else to the whole evening that just makes it a wonderful other kind of evening. But the thing is that if you move into those spaces... I’m often into things because I know that I am there because they need a quota of women. I’m out of my depth I feel that I am functioning within a structure that feels alien to me–the whole background of that structure. This festival, if we talk at evenings around the table they all refer to the same writers, the same philosophers, the same books, the same publishers–and they come from different countries, they speak different languages but there is an understanding among them that makes them confident. They know what they are about. Now you try and enter this by saying this is an opinion– and they look at you and they say ‘no, it’s not an opinion it’s a fact’ (laughter). D’you know, so you can say... so what I would say is bring more writers from Africa here, have discussions... but then on the other hand there will be an alienation, because this is not how we do festivals, we would do it in a different way... anyway... so... I think it is crucial, but it’s problematic because ultimately the structure that you are bringing people into is designed to favour those very people that must now make way for you.
EKD: But if you bring in enough people–the so called ‘critical mass’–if you bring in enough people will they not change the structure?
AK: Change the structure? You know now at universities in South Africa, at the University of the Western Cape who said we don’t care how universities are... we are the intellectual home of the left and we are focussed on communities... so the ANC’s education plan, the ANC’s economic plan, the ANC’s health plan–everything was hatched at the University of the Western Cape. OK, now when government came into power all of those academics went into government so... now here’s the university. Now this government that was practically raised by us says ‘OK we want this university– because we come from here–we want this university to be a really good university. We want you to publish in accredited journals and get the credit... Oh, what is an accredited journal? Where is the biggest and best South African accredited journal?... In London. Oh. Who are now your peers that review you there? Them. Oh. How do you change that structure? How do you change those magazines?
[End of tape side one = 45’]
[Side two] Cont:
AK: To get back to how I answer your question... this is how I think the questions are not structured in that way so you can answer it in that way... Most of the women we interviewed would start: ‘Let me tell you a story’ and you would go ‘ No! answer my question, I’m not interested in the story...’ (Laughter).
EKD: I’m not going to presume on your good nature very much longer... I’ve nearly finished but I suppose the question I’ve got to ask now really is five years on–whatever–after the Truth Commission, how do you see the future of South Africa? How do you see this new identity? Do you see the Truth Commission as establishing some sort of moral order, as it was intended to do? Did it do what it was intended to do? Or was it–I’m not sure if it was you or someone else who said–a ‘messy compromise’? Did it end up fulfilling what you expected it to do?
AK: No, I think it was burdened by too many expectations– everyone had his own set of expectations. The politicians thought it would get rid of the baggage of the past. The previous government thought it would give everyone amnesty. Many of the victims thought it would give out substantial compensation. I thought it would bring a new moral tone... And it couldn’t do all of that. Many people thought it would bring reconciliation. Others thought it would bring truth. Others thought it would bring justice. And it just... I’m often asked what advice would you have for a next Truth Commission in another country. I would say you must be very clear about what you want and take one or two things and then focus on that. Tell the population that’s why you have this commission, because you want to achieve a) and b). And then focus on that and put the resources behind that. But it can’t be this broad church which in many ways leaves everyone slightly disappointed and some people deeply disappointed. Having said that the fact that it gathered two thousand testimonies that were aired in public, that in itself is enough reason to justify the Commission, I would say, the fact that the rest failed and is messy and is problematic that may be so, but that part of it alone was, I would say, worth it. The problem now with... ja... everyone has to benefit from the change, and that is not so. A lot of people are benefiting and a lot of people have it better, but there’s too many who don’t have it better and I think that’s where the big problem lies. And at one stage that will explode if that is not dealt with properly. But it becomes now a bigger problem, it becomes... our Minister of Finance would tell you we need a six per cent growth to really start making a difference to the unemployment and poverty. We don’t. We grow four per cent at best, usually it’s two per cent. And someone else would say that the ANC was promised before 1994 if they follow a capitalist financial system they will be assisted by the West in various ways. Practically nothing of that has happened. No subsidies were counselled. No rearrangements were made. No special concessions were made for South Africa. So we at this stage are actually more capitalist than both the States and Europe, which makes a lot of people... Now we have land, you want to give black people land, but you now no longer have subsidies... so both White and Black, nobody can farm anymore, because you have to compete with farmers that do get subsidies. So now the problem gets bigger... it’s not now only a government that very successfully gathers taxes, reasonably successfully spends those taxes on people... but because of affirmative action there is big problems in the capacity to effectively deliver... But you find yourself within a world that actually doesn’t care... OK, so it’s very nice to do nice things, we want to treat you as a charity case–we will give money for you as a charity place, but we won’t make partnerships, we won’t say, listen let’s assist with your railways... especially the countries that colonised us, the Dutch and the British. Ja, so I mean, now it becomes a bigger problem... the criticism I have is local but it’s... every time that I put a foot down here in Europe. I walk in Schiphol–the way you’re clad, just the material and I look at the shoes... I mean people here are just so well off. And by well off I don’t mean rich... it’s just that... And if they don’t even give to South Africa, I mean Africa will come and take it. The rest of the world will come and take it and you will not be able to keep them out, because where else must they get that? And then the same with Whites, with the Whites in South Africa to convince them... they are not so smart, because they feel superior, genetically superior. But they are so smart because they have abused so many people for so long. So the moment that I am in Europe you can see that they think that they are so well off because actually they work very hard, they have a good work ethic. The exploitation of other people and of colonies for centuries is not part of the equation. People here are smart because they are smart. And you are poor because you are stupid and that’s that, so I don’t know... and there’s no awareness. And I know that people are sick and tired of feeling guilty, so that if someone has to write a book then you have to assist them to piggy-back them–so that they start picking up some kinds of responsibilities... Right.
EKD: I think that’s true. I think in France there is no recognition of the colonial past and that’s linked to the questions of identity too for those who are of mixed race or those whose parents or grandparents have come from former colonies, their identity is French and it doesn’t take into account this history or this diversity. The diversity is totally quashed–which is why this class on South Africa which is in a way liberating for quite a number of students because they learn a certain amount about South Africa, but indirectly it enables them to say something about themselves, which France as a secular state doesn’t allow–because the argument is that we are one and united and it doesn’t take into account other identities.
AK: You know what I find interesting–when I came here for the first time in 1990, so many people had advice for us–how we should do and how we are wrong about black people and how... And they were also remarkably liberated comments. I remember speaking to a Belgian couple and they were appalled that I had four children. I could see... they didn’t say anything but I could see that they really thought that was the pits. They didn’t have any children and they said that they would prefer the Belgians not to have children. And I said do they not mind if people came in here and took over Belgium. And they said, are we so smart that Belgium has to be ours? Let other people take Belgium... and I thought... I couldn’t sleep that night it was such a liberating thought (laughter). What makes Whites so special that they need to survive and live in South Africa? If we die out or are killed out... maybe, d’you know? I found... Now I want to go back to them now and ask whether they still think that because suddenly I arrive at an international poetry festival in Rotterdam and there is an interview with the Mayor and the Mayor says if I look out of my window I don’t want to see minarets. I don’t want to wake in the morning and hear an Imam. And I think: ‘You will not dare say that in South Africa’. It would be discriminatory, defamatory. Why... what is wrong with a minaret? And then there is this debate: what really is a Belgian? What is French culture? What are the texts that everyone has read? Ja! That sounds so familiar but... not how I remember it. So now... I always thought we were behind in South Africa, but every time I leave from here I have a feeling that we, in some ways, are ahead... The biggest challenge I think for Whites in South Africa is to learn to live as a powerless minority. We have just moved from... we thought ourselves a majority to... OK now we are actually a minority, but a powerful minority. But it is to become nothing in a country and decide a town may be run like the majority want it to be run. But that may be different. A committee or a municipality may be run according to different lines... You know we talked about rape, there was this conference on rape and one woman said to me, ‘You know rape for me is really not the worst thing that can happen to me–but a child of mine dying of hunger in my lap, for me, for me, that is the worst.’ How can I just talk and just assume, you know it is because we think rape is... So it’s things like that. It’s to give up your priorities and what you just assume is essential, and abide by what other people think is essential.
EKD: Thank you. Thank you... one last point... really short, a quickie... and this is to do with the work with the history, the ‘civilisation’ we do with the students. You gave that wonderful description of the Queen’s visit–which did make me laugh, and made the students laugh... Nowadays, is the Queen, is the Commonwealth irrelevant to South Africa?... Obviously it’s not a priority the way you described it! (Laughter) But is it something that ever appears in daily life? Is it part of South African identity or is it really irrelevant? AK: It is still there with some English speaking Whites... Or people will say to me that if you have been taught English in South Africa and you go to England, people think you are upper class because of the kind of English that you speak and they are surprised that you are so poor... It’s this thing that’s happening with Afrikaners that are in exile, that you speak in a way and you think in a way of a thing that is no longer existing... so we have that. Some people think of Britain as a place and that sort of Britain is no longer there. I know that our President Thabo Mbeki is quite on friendly terms with Tony Blair... but he has to distance himself now and then. Ja... you know we have all these foreign African countries’ statesmen that no one can pronounce their names, that move in and out... and we go there... so it’s really the priorities have shifted largely to Africa.

❃

28End

29With my thanks to MEET, and particularly to Françoise Garnier, to have made this meeting and interview possible. Elaine Kennedy-Dubourdieu