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Thomas Mofolo
Sketch of Thomas Mofolo by Frédéric Christol
Sketch of Thomas Mofolo by Frédéric Christol
Born22 December 1876
Khojane, Basutoland
Died8 September 1948
Teyateyaneng, Basutoland
OccupationNovelist
Period1907 - 1925
Notable works
  • Moeti oa Bochabela (1907)
  • Pitseng (1910)
  • Chaka (1925)

Thomas Mokopu Mofolo (22 December 1876 – 8 September 1948) is often regarded as the first African novelist. His body of work, which consists of three books composed between 1905 and 1910, were first written in Sesotho, and then widely translated.

He is best known for his third book, Chaka, a fictional retelling of the story of the rise and fall of the Zulu emperor-king Shaka.

Life edit

Despite being regarded as one of Africa's greatest novelists, no complete biography of Thomas Mofolo's life has been published.[1] Mofolo did write a short autobiographical sketch for GH Franz's The Literature of Lesotho in 1930, but it was not until 1989 that a fuller and accurate biographical outline was published by Daniel Kunene. More recently, this has been supplemented by Stephen Gill, curator of Morija Museum and Archives.[2]

The third child of Abner and Aleta Mofolo, Thomas Mofolo was born in ha Khojane, Serupane, in what was then Basutoland.[3][4]

His family were members of the Protestant church and remained loyal to the Cape Colony forces during the Basuto Gun War, which led them to flee their home and settle in Mafeteng. Having spent his early year herding the family's cattle, Mofolo began his education at the age of 10 or 12 under the guidance of Everitt Lechesa Segoete at Qomoqomong. Segoete was a great influence and would go on to be published himself. A polyglot, Mofolo learned isiXhosa and English during these years, while speaking Sesotho and Dutch with his family.[4][5][6]

 
xxxx

Mofolo continued his education, first at Masitise and then in 1894 at Morija where he attended Bible School. In 1896, he moved again to Thabeng for teacher training. Between 1896 and 1898 rinderpest killed 95% of cattle in the region, and Mofolo's family could no longer pay his school fees. By 1898, at the age of 22, Mofolo was able to complete his studies and gained employment at the Morija Sesuto Book Depot, which acted as the centre of publishing in Basutoland.[4][7][8][9]

 
Leloaleng Industrial School

His time at the Book Depot was cut short by the Anglo-Boer War, which led to shortages of paper and other materials. Thomas returned to education, this time to Leloaleng Industrial School, where he learned carpentry, before becoming a teacher at Maseru.[10][11]

In 1904 Thomas returned to the Morija Sesuto Book Depot, and that year married Francina Mats’eliso Shoarane, who was a Xhosa who had been educated in the Cape Colony. The previous year, Francina had published a short letter in Leselinyana, which was very uncommon for a woman at that time. Their first child was born in 1908.During the next few years Thomas read widely and developed his own interest in writing literature. He also became politically active, joining the Kopana ea Tsoelo-pele (the Union for Progress), which had been established in 1907.[12][13]

Thomas fled Morija in 1910, following an adulterous relationship, and moved to Johannesburg to work as a labour recruiter. He retuned to Basutoland in 1912, continuing his work as a labour agent for a mining group as well as his own private ventures. Francina died on 20 September 1915, and Thomas married his second wife, Josefina, in 1918. She died on 27 October 1927, and he married for a third time in 1933. He remained married to his third wife, Emma, until his death.[14][13]

Thomas' business ventures continued through the 1920s and 1930s, leading to the purchase of a farm in 1933 just over the border in the Union of South Africa. However, the sale was in violation of the Natives Land Act, leaving Mofolo to bear all the costs, which led to financial ruin. In 1941 he suffered a stroke from which he never fully recovered, and in 1949 he died in poverty, aged 72, in Teyateyaneng.[15][16]


(Smith for obit)

Christol, Frédéric. (1911). L'art dans l'Afrique australe. Berger-Levrault. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.5479/sil.244705.39088000226712

Works edit

Mofolo published three books during his lifetime. His career as a writer, like much of his education, was shaped by the Paris Evangelical Missionary Society. His first two works were initially serialised in Leselinyana, a missionary newspaper, before they published them in book form. His third, Chaka, was suppressed and publication was delayed by around 15 years due to the reluctance of the missionary press to release the work.[17][18]

Mofolo also produced another manuscript, The Fallen Angel, in around 1908. This was met with disapproval from the missionaries, was never published, and is now lost. Little is known of it, other than a passing reference in a contemporary missionary account that notes it set out to disprove an unspecified theory of Marie Corelli.[19][20]

His three published novels have all been translated into English and other languages, often with misconceptions and misunderstandings on the part of the translators.[21]

Moeti oa Bochabela / Traveller to the East edit

The first great modern African author is Thomas Mofolo of Basutoland. In his Pilgrim to the East (properly translated) he is the first African author who takes account of the new age.

Janheinz Jahn, 1962[22]

Moeti oa Bochabela is widely accepted as the first novel published in an African language. It was first serialised in Leselinyana in 1906 before appearing as a book the following year. In 1930, an English translation, Traveller to the East, was published by Hugh Ashton (wrongly attributed as Harry Ashton in later editions).[23]

While now considered a pioneer African novel, it was conceived as an allegory or fable and often seen to borrow heavily from Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. More recently, the place of lithoko praise poems and the influence of other Sesotho writers whose work appeared in Leselinyana, such as Daniele Methusala, have been highlighted. Set in precolonial Lesotho, the English translation sees the protagonist, Fekisi, view society being overtaken by evil, with the only solution to turn towards Christianity. Elsewhere, it is seen as a merging of Sotho beliefs and Christian thoughts.[24][25][26][27][28][29]

Moeti oa Bochabela and Pitseng are the precursors of the novel in Sotho literature, also preceding the novel form in other African languages in the subcontinent.

Nhlanhla P. Maake, 1992[24]

Pitseng / A Search for True Love edit

Like Moeti oa Bochabela, Pitseng was also serialised in Leselinyana before appearing as a book in 1910. An English translation did not appear until 2013. (Maake 161)

A novel about love and marriage, as well as the natural environment, Pitseng is set in a village in Lesotho at the beginning of the twentieth century. While vividly describing the natural world, the novel is a love story between a school teacher and a local girl. It has been interpreted as an indictment of the hypocrisy of European Christianity.[30][31][32]

Chaka edit

Likely written in 1908-09It was while he was living at Morija that Thomas produced his four works, three of which would eventually be published?

https://www.lornebair.com/pages/books/34298/thomas-t-mofolo/phakoana-tsooana-pale (this is his son?)

Complete works edit

  • Mofolo, Thomas (1907). Moeti oa Bochabela (in Southern Sotho). Morija: Sesuto Book Depot.
  • —— (1910). Pitseng (in Southern Sotho). Morija,: Sesuto Book Depot.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link)
  • —— (1925). Chaka (in Southern Sotho). Morija,: Sesuto Book Depot.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link)
  • —— (1931). Chaka. An Historical Romance. Translated by Dutton, Frederick. London: Oxford University Press.
  • —— (1934). Traveller to the East. Translated by Ashton, Hugh. Lodnon: Society for the Promotion of Christian Literature.
  • —— (1981). Chaka. Translated by Kunene, Daniel. London: Heinemann.
  • —— (2013). Pitseng: The Search for True Love. Translated by Kunene, Daniel. Morija: Morija Museum & Archives.


https://slipnet.co.za/view/reviews/pitseng-confirms-mofolo-as-master-story-teller/


References edit

  1. ^ Ricard 2004, p. ix.
  2. ^ Gill 2016, p. 15.
  3. ^ Gill 2016, p. 21.
  4. ^ a b c Jeffrey 2010, p. 38.
  5. ^ Gill 2016, p. 23.
  6. ^ Gill 2016, p. 25.
  7. ^ Gill 2016, p. 26-27.
  8. ^ Gill 2016, p. 29-30.
  9. ^ Phoofolo 2003, p. 503.
  10. ^ Gill 2016, p. 31-32.
  11. ^ Jeffrey 2010, p. 39.
  12. ^ Gill 2016, p. 33-34.
  13. ^ a b Jeffrey 2010, p. 39-40.
  14. ^ Gill 2016, p. 34.
  15. ^ Jeffrey 2010, p. 40-41.
  16. ^ Ricard 2004, p. 109.
  17. ^ Maake 1992, p. 160.
  18. ^ Jeffrey 2010, p. 48.
  19. ^ Boegner 1912, p. 508.
  20. ^ Gérard 1971, p. 112.
  21. ^ Ricard 2016.
  22. ^ Jahn 1962.
  23. ^ Maake 1992, p. 164.
  24. ^ a b Maake 1992, p. 161.
  25. ^ Makamane 2023, p. 85.
  26. ^ Gikandi 2021, p. 326.
  27. ^ Ricard 2016, p. 56.
  28. ^ Kunene 1986, p. 13.
  29. ^ Wenzel 2021, p. 350.
  30. ^ Makamane 2023, p. 89.
  31. ^ Ricard 2016, p. 57.
  32. ^ Wenzel 2021, p. 340.

References edit




Harris, Ashleigh (2022). "Early Sesotho, isiXhosa and isiZulu Novels as World Literature". In Fyfe, Alexander; Krishnan, Madhu (eds.). African Literatures as World Literature. Bloomsbury. pp. 115–138. ISBN 9781501379963.

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