Reinventing a Continent: Writing and Politics in South Africa

André Brink was born on May 29, 1935 in Vrede, South Africa. He studied English and Afrikaans at the University in Potchefstroom and comparative literature in Paris. He was a South African writer and educator. He became a part of a group of writers known as Die Sestigers upon returning to South Africa in the 1960s. The group aimed to broaden show more Afrikaner fiction by writing about sexual and moral matters and the failings of the traditional political system. His books included Rumors of Rain, Looking on Darkness, A Dry White Season, and States of Emergency. Some of his books were banned in South Africa. He became a professor of Afrikaans and Dutch literature at Rhodes University and professor of English at the University of Cape Town. He has received the 1980 Martin Luther King Prize, the 1980 French Prix Medicis Etranger, and the 1982 Chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur. He was shortlisted for the Booker Prize twice and nominated for the Nobel Prize for literature on several occasions. He died on February 6, 2015 at the age of 79. (Bowker Author Biography) show less