Date: 19/08/2006
Source: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
Title: Ndebele: Memorial service of Professor Mazisi Kunene
Speech by Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, S Ndebele, at the memorial service of Prof. Mazisi Kunene, Durban City Hall
Greetings
Today marks a sad day in the literary and cultural research calendar of South Africa. We have assembled to mourn the death of one of our literary giant, the Poet Laureate, Professor Mazisi Kunene. We have come to mourn, with a full knowledge that Mazisi Kunene enriched our lives through literary outputs pitched at the level of the best in the world.
We have come to mourn the end of the life of a genius .We have assembled to celebrate creativity, both intellectual and physical. When people in our midst pass away, we are often afforded an opportunity to re-assess life, its meaning and its bare elements. By so doing we afford ourselves an opportunity to understand that our individual lives are but part of a long chain of inter-connectedness, for no human being is an island.
Literary Maestro
There is a space in the life of every home, every community, every region and every nation, for creativity to flourish. Creative writing, creative expression and creative analysis are godly, for they put before our naked eyes and feelings, experiences that have otherwise continuously evaded us. Today we are afforded, through the passing away of one of our dearest friends and comrades, an opportunity to witness the completion of literary genius and excellence. Oh! Death where is thy sting? Oh! Death where is thy victory? Mhlaba kawunoni. Ziyofa izinsizwa kusale izibongo.
There is sometimes a temptation in the life of every family, every community, every region and every nation to dismember heritage and creativity, and in so doing dismember the orchestra of life. This is particularly the saddest of all consequences of slavery, colonialism and apartheid which once bedevilled our lives on the African continent and elsewhere in the Diaspora. But now we are free people, and it is our duty to immortalise our thinkers, our poets, our researchers and our inventors of knowledge. Mazisi Kunene has shown us the way.
Mazisi Kunene was a genius, a thinker, a writer and a researcher. As a genius he sometimes wrote and said things which were simply beyond our ordinary comprehension. We loved him. As a thinker he dedicated his time to making thinking a full time occupation, and its products a fine art of life expressions. By making thinking so close to everyday life he sometimes scared us, for the very thought of thinking about thinking and its consequences is scary to most of us.
Giving value to words
As a writer he established and sustained value for both the spoken and the written word, and reminded us that in terms of how the world has functioned over the past four to seven thousand years, it is the written word that lasts. This explains why he saw value in committing Zulu oral history to text. As a researcher, he was reluctant to take things at face value, and sought to dig deep into the source of things through systematic enquiry and analysis. Such are the dynamics of a complete life.
His death marks a major loss to his family, to his friends, to the relatives, to the province, the country, the continent, the world and the ANC family. His genius was characterised by humility, a virtue that needs to be crafted among all people for it represents the finer details of civilisation. He was equally at ease with Kings, Princes, Presidents, Heads of State, academia, business gurus; as he was at ease with common people and the down trodden, nameless and faceless masses of the hoi polloi. That is a rare gift, and most at his level would have preferably stuck with the Kings, Princes and Presidents once he tasted their company. He chose versatility.
He fearlessly struggled against apartheid and the elements that sustained it. He would not succumb to the confines of apartheid scholarship and its narrow definition of literary beloved country, went to exile and represented the African National Congress at various levels as the movement navigated through a long and windy struggle for liberation. At the end he won, the liberation movement triumphed and on 27 April 1994 the people of South Africa were freed. Government intervention
How do we remember him? The Government of KwaZulu-Natal, through the office of the Premier, has started with a project called the IsiZulu Language and Literature Heritage Project. This is an African Renaissance project and flows from the inputs which came from some 400 academics and intellectuals who assembled in Durban for the African Renaissance and African intellectuality Summit in May 2006.
This project is seeing the collection, documentation, scanning, and digitisation and putting on display of all old literary works in isiZulu, about isiZulu and about the people and province of KwaZulu-Natal. Writers, alive and those who have passed on are being profiled and immortalised. We are accessing the best technology for this project. On 8 September 2006, we are holding a Provincial Colloquium on this subject. We have established that we will fund this effort to run between now and 2009.
Some of our best writers like Dr J.L. Dube, Prof. B.W. Vilakazi and Prof. Sibusiso Nyembezi will soon come to life, once more. This tally well with our project to eliminate illiteracy in the province by 2008.
This research, combined with the technology outlay will cost in the region of R10 million over three years, lays the foundation for The Mazisi Kunene IsiZulu Language and Literature Hall of Fame which we will soon found. It is to be housed in the KwaZulu-Natal Multi- media Heritage Museum to be erected as part of the new King Senzangakhona Stadium, so that come 2010, our visitors will experience a complete picture about our collective accomplishments in the literary world. This is to be our major repository for the renewed woks.
Ngalamazwi ngithi siyisifundazwe saKwaZulu-Natal, isifundazwe sakho Mntimande. Sithi lala ngoxolo, lala uphumule. Uyilwile impi yosiba. Uzusivuselele singaphumuli.
Amandla!
Enquires:
Thulani Sithole
Deputy Director: Media Liaison
Tel: (033) 341 3428
Cell: 082 317 3727
E-mail: sitholtn@premier.kzntl.gov.za
Issued by: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
19 August 2006
Source: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
Title: Ndebele: Memorial service of Professor Mazisi Kunene
Speech by Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, S Ndebele, at the memorial service of Prof. Mazisi Kunene, Durban City Hall
Greetings
Today marks a sad day in the literary and cultural research calendar of South Africa. We have assembled to mourn the death of one of our literary giant, the Poet Laureate, Professor Mazisi Kunene. We have come to mourn, with a full knowledge that Mazisi Kunene enriched our lives through literary outputs pitched at the level of the best in the world.
We have come to mourn the end of the life of a genius .We have assembled to celebrate creativity, both intellectual and physical. When people in our midst pass away, we are often afforded an opportunity to re-assess life, its meaning and its bare elements. By so doing we afford ourselves an opportunity to understand that our individual lives are but part of a long chain of inter-connectedness, for no human being is an island.
Literary Maestro
There is a space in the life of every home, every community, every region and every nation, for creativity to flourish. Creative writing, creative expression and creative analysis are godly, for they put before our naked eyes and feelings, experiences that have otherwise continuously evaded us. Today we are afforded, through the passing away of one of our dearest friends and comrades, an opportunity to witness the completion of literary genius and excellence. Oh! Death where is thy sting? Oh! Death where is thy victory? Mhlaba kawunoni. Ziyofa izinsizwa kusale izibongo.
There is sometimes a temptation in the life of every family, every community, every region and every nation to dismember heritage and creativity, and in so doing dismember the orchestra of life. This is particularly the saddest of all consequences of slavery, colonialism and apartheid which once bedevilled our lives on the African continent and elsewhere in the Diaspora. But now we are free people, and it is our duty to immortalise our thinkers, our poets, our researchers and our inventors of knowledge. Mazisi Kunene has shown us the way.
Mazisi Kunene was a genius, a thinker, a writer and a researcher. As a genius he sometimes wrote and said things which were simply beyond our ordinary comprehension. We loved him. As a thinker he dedicated his time to making thinking a full time occupation, and its products a fine art of life expressions. By making thinking so close to everyday life he sometimes scared us, for the very thought of thinking about thinking and its consequences is scary to most of us.
Giving value to words
As a writer he established and sustained value for both the spoken and the written word, and reminded us that in terms of how the world has functioned over the past four to seven thousand years, it is the written word that lasts. This explains why he saw value in committing Zulu oral history to text. As a researcher, he was reluctant to take things at face value, and sought to dig deep into the source of things through systematic enquiry and analysis. Such are the dynamics of a complete life.
His death marks a major loss to his family, to his friends, to the relatives, to the province, the country, the continent, the world and the ANC family. His genius was characterised by humility, a virtue that needs to be crafted among all people for it represents the finer details of civilisation. He was equally at ease with Kings, Princes, Presidents, Heads of State, academia, business gurus; as he was at ease with common people and the down trodden, nameless and faceless masses of the hoi polloi. That is a rare gift, and most at his level would have preferably stuck with the Kings, Princes and Presidents once he tasted their company. He chose versatility.
He fearlessly struggled against apartheid and the elements that sustained it. He would not succumb to the confines of apartheid scholarship and its narrow definition of literary beloved country, went to exile and represented the African National Congress at various levels as the movement navigated through a long and windy struggle for liberation. At the end he won, the liberation movement triumphed and on 27 April 1994 the people of South Africa were freed. Government intervention
How do we remember him? The Government of KwaZulu-Natal, through the office of the Premier, has started with a project called the IsiZulu Language and Literature Heritage Project. This is an African Renaissance project and flows from the inputs which came from some 400 academics and intellectuals who assembled in Durban for the African Renaissance and African intellectuality Summit in May 2006.
This project is seeing the collection, documentation, scanning, and digitisation and putting on display of all old literary works in isiZulu, about isiZulu and about the people and province of KwaZulu-Natal. Writers, alive and those who have passed on are being profiled and immortalised. We are accessing the best technology for this project. On 8 September 2006, we are holding a Provincial Colloquium on this subject. We have established that we will fund this effort to run between now and 2009.
Some of our best writers like Dr J.L. Dube, Prof. B.W. Vilakazi and Prof. Sibusiso Nyembezi will soon come to life, once more. This tally well with our project to eliminate illiteracy in the province by 2008.
This research, combined with the technology outlay will cost in the region of R10 million over three years, lays the foundation for The Mazisi Kunene IsiZulu Language and Literature Hall of Fame which we will soon found. It is to be housed in the KwaZulu-Natal Multi- media Heritage Museum to be erected as part of the new King Senzangakhona Stadium, so that come 2010, our visitors will experience a complete picture about our collective accomplishments in the literary world. This is to be our major repository for the renewed woks.
Ngalamazwi ngithi siyisifundazwe saKwaZulu-Natal, isifundazwe sakho Mntimande. Sithi lala ngoxolo, lala uphumule. Uyilwile impi yosiba. Uzusivuselele singaphumuli.
Amandla!
Enquires:
Thulani Sithole
Deputy Director: Media Liaison
Tel: (033) 341 3428
Cell: 082 317 3727
E-mail: sitholtn@premier.kzntl.gov.za
Issued by: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
19 August 2006
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