Literature & Ideas
Peerless
Miriam Tlali
1933 – 2017
The first Black South African woman to publish a novel — banned on sight
Peerless is level 1 of 4 in the South Africa Hall of Fame: changed the field itself. Tell the country's story without them and the story breaks. See how the levels work.
Why they are here
She wrote Muriel at Metropolitan in 1969. It took six years and repeated rejections to get published, the publisher cut what it feared the censors would catch, and the Censorship Board banned it anyway.
Miriam Tlali was the first Black woman in South Africa to publish a novel in English.
She wrote Muriel at Metropolitan in 1969; it was turned down by publisher after publisher and did not appear until 1975, when Ravan Press issued it having first removed passages they expected the Censorship Board to object to. The board banned it almost immediately as undesirable. It was published internationally as Between Two Worlds.
The novel was the first time a Black South African woman's consciousness was set down in the first person — the first time the word "I" in South African literature belonged to her. She died in 2017.
She wrote Muriel at Metropolitan in 1969; it was turned down by publisher after publisher and did not appear until 1975, when Ravan Press issued it having first removed passages they expected the Censorship Board to object to. The board banned it almost immediately as undesirable. It was published internationally as Between Two Worlds.
The novel was the first time a Black South African woman's consciousness was set down in the first person — the first time the word "I" in South African literature belonged to her. She died in 2017.
- Wikipedia — Miriam Tlali
- South African History Online — Miriam Tlali
- The Conversation — Rest in power, Miriam Tlali: author, enemy of apartheid and feminist
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