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The Lovedale Press: Literature for the Bantu Revisited

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

Jeffrey Peires
Jeffrey Peires*
Affiliation:
Rhodes University
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The fact is that the mass of the vernacular literature published in the past emanated, and still to-day emanates, from missionary presses, and naturally such literature has sought to fulfil the aims of missionary societies.

The special features of written vernacular history as a specific category of African historical documentation still await a general theoretical analysis. This article makes no attempt to remedy the deficiency, but considers two possible hypotheses from the relationship between Xhosa traditional historians and the Lovedale Press during the 1930s. First cf Vansina, that it is not only oral traditions which are affected by their mode of transmission. Second, cf Goody and Watt, that it is one thing to be literate, but quite another to find a publisher.

Perhaps the first printed work in Xhosa was that of a stoic-looking cow bestriding the legend “All cattle come from God,” which appeared in 1823. The writer was Rev. John Bennie of the Glasgow Missionary Society, and the printing was done at the Chumie mission station, shortly to be renamed Lovedale. From that time, Lovedale remained the focal point of the literate Christian culture which emerged among the Xhosa of South Africa's Eastern Cape. This primacy was reinforced in 1915 when the South African Native College (now Fort Hare) was established nearby under the chairmanship of the Principal of Lovedale. The Lovedale Press flourished along with its host institution. The only available estimates indicate that up to January 1939, 238 books were produced in Xhosa, more than in any African language except Swahili.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 6 , 1979 , pp. 155 - 175
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1979

References

NOTES

1. Shepherd, R.H.W., Lovedale and Literature for the Bantu (Lovedale, 1945).Google Scholar The book included the following note: “This book was submitted as supplementary to the main Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Literature and accepted by the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.” (unpaginated). The present paper is based primarily on the records of the Lovedale Press which have been deposited in the Cory Library, Rhodes University, Grahamstown. They do not cover the entire life of the press, but run from approximately 1928 to 1953. They consist of files arranged in alphabetical order by name of correspondent; published and unpublished manuscripts; and MS 16,297, Cory Library, Minutes of the Press Committee and the Press Sub-committee. I would like to thank Sandy Fold, Jackson Vena, and John Claughton for their assistance.

2. Vansina, Jan, Oral Tradition (London, 1965)Google Scholar; Goody, J. and Watt, I., “The Consequences of Literacy” in Goody, J., ed., Literacy in Traditional Societies (Cambridge, 1968), pp. 27–68.Google Scholar

3. It is not known with certainty which of Lovedale's pamphlets was the very first. The one referred to was reproduced as the frontispiece to Bennie, W.G., Imibengo (Lovedale, 1935).Google Scholar

4. The authorized version of Lovedale's history is Shepherd, R.H.W., Lovedale, South Africa: The Story of a Century (Lovedale, 1941).Google Scholar Lovedale has recently attracted a good deal of more critical scrutiny, most of which remains unpublished. See Brock, S.M., “James Stewart and Lovedale,” (Ph.D., Edinburgh, 1974)Google Scholar; Davis, R.H., “Nineteenth Century African Education in the Cape Colony,” (Ph.D., Wisconsin, 1969).Google Scholar This paper will not touch on the role of the mission institution, but will confine itself resolutely to the Lovedale Press.

5. Books for Africa, (January, 1939) cited in Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, pp. 25–26.Google Scholar

6. Oosthuizen, G.C., Shepherd of Lovedale: A Life for Southern Africa (Johannesburg, 1970)Google Scholar, the only biography, is a curious affair. Oosthuizen was part of the South African government's takeover of Fort Hare, Lovedale's neighbor, in 1959. His political orientation led him to admire most those aspects of Shepherd's career which liberals find most embarrassing. The most valuable part of the book is its exhaustive bibliography of Shepherd's voluminous writings.

7. Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, p. 26.Google Scholar

8. Ibid, p. 26.

9. Ibid, p. 89.

10. Ibid, pp. 27, 85.

11. Ibid, p. 89.

12. Ibid, p. 52.

13. MS 16, 297. Minutes of the Press Committee, 24 August 1936.

14. Oosthuizen, , Shepherd, p. 36.Google Scholar File, S.E.K. Mqhayi, Shepherd -- I. Oldjohn, 22 February 1940. File, T.B. Soga, D.D.T. Jabavu -- Shepherd, 6 September 1935.

15. Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, p. 96.Google Scholar

16. Ibid, p. 70.

17. Ibid, p. 75.

18. The lack of any full bibliography makes precision impossible. Emfundisweni did bring out two vernacular histories by W.D. Cingo, the local school principal: I-bali lama-Mpondo (History of the Mpondo) and I-bali laba-Tembu (History of the Thembu), both around 1930. Neither is of great historical value. I have been able to trace only three other books published by this press, and these all appear to be of a devotional nature and were also published in the early 1930s.

19. The first of these was W.B. Rubusana's valuable collection of oral traditions and praise poems, Zemk'iinkomo Magwal-andini (The Cattle are going you cowards!) (printed by Butler and Tanner, Frome, 1906). At the time, Rubusana was still on the payroll of Cecil Rhodes' successors in the Cape Progressive Party. The success of this collection prompted Rubusana to collect material for a second edition, but it never appeared. The others were all by S.E.K. Mqhayi. See Scott, P.E., Samuel Edward Krune Mqhayi, 1875-1945: A Bibliographic Survey (Communication no. 5, Department of African Languages, Rhodes University, 1976).Google Scholar

20. File, J.H. Soga. J. Henderson -- Soga, 17 June 1929. File, D.D.T. Jabavu, Jabavu -- Shepherd, 12 February 1937. D.D.T. Jabavu, Foreword to Kawa (July 1929). It is significant that it took the comparatively well-educated and prosperous Mfengu seven years to raise £10 for publication of Kawa's manuscript.

21. Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, p. 19.Google Scholar

22. Ibid, p. 68. MS 16,297. Minutes of the Press Committee, 11 August 1933 with annexures describing a visit from the Secretary of the Federation of Master Printers.

23. File, L.K. Siwisa. Siwisa -- Shepherd, 15 August 1949.

24. File, L.T. Manyase. Manyase -- Shepherd, 16 March 1941.

25. File, M. Molema. Shepherd -- Molema, 10 January 1940; Molema -- Shepherd, 17 January 1940.

26. Fairly full financial statements appear in MS 16,297, Minutes of Press Committee on the following dates: 19 March 1930; 26 March 1931; 3 March 1932; 5 June 1933; 9 February 1934. Passing references in the Minutes of the Press Subcommittee, 22 February 1938 and 14 February 1940 indicate that the position remained unchanged for the remainder of the decade. The greatest profits came from the printing unit, followed by the bookroom. Publishing always made the smallest contribution but it consistently maintained a comfortable credit balance.

27. Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, p. 54.Google Scholar

28. File, P.L. Hunter, Hunter -- Shepherd, 7 January 1950 refers to African Dawn as “selling so badly” and only 175 copies sold. File, C.J. Uys, Principal -- Randles and Davis, 10 January 1936. In the Era of Shepstone sold only 371 copies in two years, and the net loss was £93.12.4. File, Father Callaway, Shepherd -- Callaway, 31 July 1941. Under the Oaks sold fewer than 450 copies in seven years. The only African-authored publication which seems to have made a comparable loss was H.I.E. Dhlomo's English drama, The Girl Who Killed to Save.

29. File, Tswana Readers. A Sandilands -- Shepherd, 29 November 1939.

30. File, S.T. Plaatje, Account to Estate Sol T. Plaatje, 22 September 1942.

31. File, A.C. Jordan, Shepherd -- J. Urdang, 17 March 1950.

32. File, Committees, Minutes of Press Sub-committee, 19 April 1945. MS 16,297, Minutes of Press Committee, 27 September 1939.

33. File, T.B. Soga, passim.

34. Files, Stewart Xhosa Readers, Stewart Zulu Readers, Stewart Tswana Readers.

35. For general background see Tucker, A.N., “Orthographic Systems and Conventions in sub-Saharan Africa” Current Trends in Linguistics, 7(1971), pp. 618–53.Google Scholar More specifically, see Bennie, W.G., “Xosa Orthography,” South African Outlook, April 1931Google Scholar; idem, Notes on the New Xhosa Orthography (Lovedale, 1937).

36. Plaatje, S.T., “Suggested New Bantu Orthography,” South African Outlook, May 1931Google Scholar

37. File, J.H. Soga, Soga-Shepherd, 10 August 1937. File, S.E.K. Mqhayi, Mqhayi -- Shepherd, 22 November 1939; undated, unsigned report on Third Part of Don Jadu.

38. Plaatje, to Editor, South African Outlook, August 1931.Google Scholar

39. Shepherd, , Lovedale and Literature, p. 53.Google Scholar

40. The most convenient exposition of these matters is Moyer, R.A., “Some Current Manifestations of Early Mfengu History,” Institute of Commonwealth Studies Collected Seminar Papers on the Societies of Southern Africa, III, (1971/1972).Google Scholar

41. Ross, B.J., His Ancestry and Some Writings (Lovedale, 1948).Google Scholar

42. The section is based on correspondence in the J.H. Soga file. The Xhosa manuscript referred to is in the Cory Library collection.

43. MS 16,297, Minutes of Press Sub-committee, 22 November 1939.

44. The typescript is in the Cory Library collection. The emendations mentioned refer to the following pages in the 1971 reprint of Imibengo (note that all reprints of this work have substantially the same pagination). In the order cited in the text: pp. 146, 149, 155 and 156, 151, 131, 130, 192.

45. File T.B. Soga, Memo by B. Bangeni enclosed in Shepherd -- W.G. Bennie, 13 February 1936; D.D.T. Jabavu -- Shepherd, 11 March 1936.

46. I regret that I have been unable to see Wandile Kuse's recent University of Wisconsin dissertation on Mqhayi. For more information on Mqhayi see Jordan, A.C., Towards an African Literature (Berkeley, 1973)Google Scholar; South African Outlook, (December, 1975); P.E. Scott (see note 20 above). References in this paragraph are to pp. 134-35 and 123 of the seventh printing (1931?) of Ityala lamaWele.

47. This section is based on a comparison between the seventh printing and the abridged edition.

48. Abridged edition (1976 impression), p. iv; seventh printing, p. vi.

49. File, S.E.K. Mqhayi.

50. MS 16,297. Minutes of Press Sub-committee, 18 October 1939.

51. This is apparent from the tone of the S.E.K. Mqhayi file, and from the letter Shepherd wrote to W.G. Bennie on reading Mqhayi's autobiography (9 May 1938). “I must say when I read the MS in English, I laid it down with a greater liking for the author.” Shepherd was, however, very careful to praise Mqhayi in his public pronouncements. See, for example, Chapter 31 of his Bantu Literature and Life (Lovedale, 1955).Google Scholar

52. MS 16,297, Minutes of Press Committee, 19 March 1930. The rest of this section is based on the S.E.K. Mqhayi file, unless otherwise indicated.

53. MS 16,297, Minutes of Press Sub-committee, 20 March 1940.

54. Ibid, sub 17 April 1940.

55. File, W. Mazwi.

56. File, B.J. Ross. Shepherd -- F. Ross, 14 October 1947. Ross, B.J., His Ancestry, pp. 42–43.Google Scholar

57. Kawa, I-Bali, Chapter 10.

58. File C.J. Uys. Shepherd -- Uys, 1 December 1933. Lobengula was finally published in 1963.

59. South African Outlook (January 1932). This section is based on the L.D. Raditladi file, except where otherwise indicated. There is a short biography of Raditladi in Stevens, Richard, Historical Dictionary of Botswana (Metuchen, N.J., 1975), pp. 120–21.Google Scholar

60. File, Stewart Tswana Readers, note by Shepherd of conversations with Bennie, 17 November 1938.

61. I would like to thank Neil Parsons for his help with the Botswana background. For further details, see Parsons, Q.N., “Shots for a Black Republic? Simon Ratshosa and Botswana Nationalism,” African Affairs, 73(1974), pp. 449–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Benson, Mary, Tshekedi Khama (London, 1960).Google Scholar

62. Rowe, J.A., “Myth, Memoir and Moral Admonition: Luganda Historical Writing, 1893-1969,” Uganda Journal, 33(1969), p. 26Google Scholar; Law, R., “Early Yoruba Historiography,” History in Africa, 3(1976), p. 74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

63. Peires, J.B., “A History of the Xhosa c. 1700-1835” (M.A. Rhodes University, 1976), p. 27.Google Scholar

64. Twaddle, M., “On Ganda Historiography,” History in Africa, 1(1974), p. 98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar