Tatamkhulu Afrika

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Ismail Joubert (7 December 1920 – 23 December 2002), commonly known as Tatamkhulu Afrika, was a South African poet and writer. Tatamkhulu Afrika means Grandfather Africa in Xhosa.

He was born Mogamed Fu’ad Nasif in Sallum, Egypt, to an Egyptian father and a Turkish mother, and moved to South Africa as a child. After his parents died of flu, he was raised by family friends and used the name John Carlton. His first novel, Broken Earth, was published when he was seventeen (under his Methodist name). More than fifty years later came his next book, a poetry collection called Nine Lives.

In World War II he fought in North Africa and was captured at Tobruk. His time as a prisoner of war shaped his writing.

After the war he left his foster family and spent time in Namibia, where an Afrikaans family fostered him and he began using the name Jozua Joubert.

In 1964 he converted to Islam and legally changed his name to Ismail Joubert. He spent time in prison, where he witnessed state abuse against political prisoners, a major theme in his work.

He lived in Cape Town’s District Six, a mixed-race community destroyed by apartheid. He refused to identify as white and helped found Al-Jihaad to oppose the destruction of District Six and apartheid; this group later joined the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto We Sizwe. He was given the name Tatamkhulu Afrika, which he used from then on.

In 1987 he was arrested for terrorism and banned from speaking or writing in public for five years, but he continued to write under his adopted name. He was imprisoned in the same jail as Nelson Mandela and was released in 1992.

Tatamkhulu Afrika died on 23 December 2002, at 82, after being run over by a car two weeks earlier. This happened shortly after his last novel Bitter Eden appeared.

His awards include the Molteno Award for lifetime contribution to South African literature, and in 1996 his works were translated into French. His autobiography Mr Chameleon was published posthumously in 2005. He left unpublished works, including two novels, four short novels, two plays, and poetry.