RaDical MiDDle - ColdType

Radical Middle | 145
protested that distributors kept giving him three Frontlines
though he’d told them he didn’t do communist literature. The
university of Pretoria censored their rag Mag for lifting (with
permission, unlike the army) a spoof article on Sa attitudes
(from “My Bantus prefer it like this”, to “I don’t like the
Hairybacks because they’re so racist on the afs”).
Years later a journalist, colleen ryan, now in australia,
got access to Beyers Naude’s Department of Justice file for a
biography and found in it a bunch of misfiled papers on me,
which she gave me. I was stupefied; there was amazingly closeup
info in there, movies I’d been to, people I’d visited, and there
was imaginary stuff – not exaggerated, imaginary – about links
and allies I never heard of.
along the way I also received an anonymous S e c r e T
police memo telling Minister of Justice alwyn Schlebusch
that “although frONTLINe prints the views of all sections,
contributions from the Black consciousness section and also, to
lesser extent, the radical anti-white section of the community
by far exceeds that of the section with the opposite sentiments”.
Moreover, I “consistently associated with radical and leftist
personalities”.
So my stocks are high among radical and leftist personalities,
right? No-o. Helen Joseph her saintly self told all and sundry over
and again that I was a paid secret agent of the Nat reformists,
reporting direct to Pik Botha. I couldn’t get properly mad at
someone whose life was lived in permanent house arrest, but I
was tempted.
In a way I was glad that the slander-stories were two-handed.
Why, I’m not sure. It’s not logical. Lefties’ hearts are often in a
right place and righties’ hearts are mainly not, but getting it
from both sides vouched for a freedom, of sorts.
Which Trevor Tutu memorably punctured. at a party in
Melrose, Trevor, son of the arch and a fun fellow despite his
bad press, said archly: “Denis, I’m sure you’re told that if both
right and Left dump on you you’re doing something good”. I
blushed with due modesty and said, yes, sure. Trevor leaned