The Quiet Violence of Dreams by Sello Duiker

The author said at the time that he had written Dreams for his contemporaries it is a fascinating look at youth culture and the way that young South Africans, black and white, are trying to create an identity that blends their Africanness with global culture. Sex in Sello's novels is a way to return to the essential self hidden behind race and gender. Masculinity, especially the changing nature of black male identity, is explored. Much of Dreams is set in a gay massage parlour where Tshepo, the (black) chief protagonist, services mostly white clients. He explored this to great effect in his novels along with Phaswane Mpe (obituary December 22 2004), he was one of the most promising post-apartheid writers, representing the frontier generation who attempt to transcend race in their exploration of South Africa.Īpartheid era literature had been based around narratives of blackness and whiteness, but for Sello, sex was the primary marker of identity. This led to an identity crisis for young Sello, torn between two warring cultures. The pressure for solidarity was intense and, by the mid-1980s, coercive and violent. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, schools were the focus of the anti-apartheid struggle in Soweto, and student leaders at its forefront.

His father, Judah, had been torn between the desire to show solidarity with the black struggle and to give his sons the best possible education. This was at the height of racial polarisation and Sello was one of only two black children in his class. He was born in Orlando West, Soweto, at the height of the liberation struggle, and his relatively affluent family decided to send him to a private school in the white suburbs.

The Quiet Violence of Dreams by Sello Duiker