ABSTRACT
Ever since South Africa’s first democratic elections in which all the population, black and white, were able to vote for the first time, it has been in the process of coming to terms with its often violent and divisive past in order to move on as a ‘rainbow nation’. The ‘new’ South Africa cannot, of course, sever its connections with the old South Africa. It is only ‘post’ apartheid in the sense of its having to come to terms with the effects of that period of history, notably through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but also in formulating priorities for the nation and for individuals. Literature, naturally, follows a similar trajectory. As Attridge and Jolly have noted in their Introduction to Writing South Africa: ‘the current South African situation forms a productive arena for the exploration of the uses and limitations of, as well as alternatives to, judgemental writing’ (Attridge and Jolly 1998: 7).
