I was forwarded the front and back covers of a new book–edited by William Gumede (author of a book on Thabo Mbeki) and Leslie Dikeni (brother of poet Sandile)–on South African intellectual culture. I don’t have more information except that it appears to focus on the Thabo Mbeki era, a period characterized by virulent anti-intellectualism. Dikeni’s chapter is on “pseudo-intellectuals,” while Jeremy Cronin writes on the late exiled ANC intellectual, Comrade Mzala–remember Mzala’s 1980s book on Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, “Chief with a Double Agenda”? which had to be pulled from library shelves after the Chief objected?

The book also has contributions from Jonathan Jansen (the first black university president of the University of the Free State), US-based literature professor Grant Farred, Mahmood Mamdani, and poet James Matthews.

I am curious to read Cronin’s take on Mzala.