South African interest: The legacy of André Brink and Ingrid Jonker

The recently published love letters of André Brink and Ingrid Jonker have drawn attention to these two iconic South African writers and are widely discussed in the South African literary scene. 

Andre Brink, who died in February 2015, was a South African novelist, who wrote in both Afrikaans and English. He was a Professor of English at the University of Cape Town. 

In the 1960s he, Ingrid Jonker, Etienne Leroux and Breyten Breytenbach were key figures in the Afrikaans literary movement known as Die Sestigers. These writers sought to use Afrikaans to speak out against the apartheid government, and brought into Afrikaans literature the influence of contemporary English and French trends. 

 

 

Ingrid Jonker, the South African poet who committed suicide in 1965, has reached iconic status in South Africa and is often called the South African Sylvia Plath, due to the intensity of her work and the tragic course of her turbulent life.

Her first collection of Afrikaans poems, Na die somer (“After the summer”) was produced before she was thirteen. Her first published book of poems, Ontvlugting (“Escape”), was published in 1956.

Jonker's next collection of poems Rook en oker ("Smoke and Ochre") was published in 1963 after delays caused by the conservative approach of her publishers. While the collection was praised by most South African writers, poets and critics, it was given a cool reception by the more conservative white South African public. 

Jonker had affairs with two writers, Jack Cope and Andre Brink. 

The romance between Jonker and Brink is possibly South Africa’s most famous literary romance.

Brink's "Kennis van die Aand" first (banned) edition, published in 1973. Lot 147 in Auction #47

This is believed to be the first Afrikaans book to have been banned in South Africa. Its main characters are the lovers Josef and Jessica - a "brown" man and a white woman. 

A very good copy of a landmark Afrikaans novel.

"In Memoriam Ingrid Jonker" in Afrikaans and English. Lot 150 in Auction #47

Published in the year following Jonker's death, the book also announced the Ingrid Jonker Prize. The fund's patrons were N P van Wyk Louw and Uys Krige, while the seven trustees were representatives of the poet's publishers - Human & Rousseau, John Malherbe and Simondium - and the writers Jack Cope, Adele Naude, Hennie Aucamp and Jan Rabie.

The letters that André Brink and Ingrid Jonker wrote to one another during their love affair in the early 1960s have been published by Umuzi (Penguin Random House) in November 2015. Brink was working on a novel titled Goudstof at the time of his death. He offered the correspondence between himself and Jonker to Umuzi for publication several months before his death in February 2015.
Jonker’s original letters, together with carbon copies of the letters Brink addressed to her, were kept in brown envelopes in the author’s study for over fifty years. Among the documents are telegrams and early versions of Jonker’s poems.
Literary critic and widow of André Brink, Karina Brink, arranged the letters in chronological order before scanning them, after which they were typed up by Erika Viljoen, a friend and former student of the author.
Book historian and editor of the journal LitNet Akademies (Geesteswetenskappe) Francis Galloway proofread the typed documents against the original texts and provided contextual support for the Umuzi publication.
The letters were not edited or annotated.

A limited edition of the landmark publication Flame in the Snow (in Afrikaans and in English), one of South Africa’s publishing highlights in 2015, is available from Penguin Random House.
The book includes previously unseen photographs from Andre Brink’s private collection, with an extra intimate photo section that does not appear in the standard edition.
Only 1000 numbered copies of this limited edition have been published in each language.