The Individual, Auto/biography and History in South Africa

leader, Bill Andrews. 58 Written from different political perspectives, these
auto/biographies focused on the lives of resistance leaders, ranging from Albert Luthuli
and Clements Kadalie to Johnny Gomas and Moses Mayekiso. 59 They presented partisan
stories of nationalist or socialist resistance politics, or narratives of political or trade union
organising. Each set out to explain or justify a set of political decisions, or to construct
their subject as supportive of particular political strategies.
In many cases, the process of production was significant. Some were constructed as
biographic memoirs involving the intervention of amanuenses. An example of such an
auto/biography was the account of Albert Luthuli’s life, Let My People Go: An
Autobiography. Charles and Sheila Hooper, whom Luthuli described as his “amanuenses”
were deeply involved in every stage of the production of this text. Each made
“independent records” from dictation by Luthuli. These were then reassembled and
“arranged ... chronologically” to comprise a first draft of the book. To this Luthuli added
his “afterthoughts” and “occasional corrections”. 60
Another example of collaborative authorship in the creation of an auto/biographic text of
the experience of apartheid repression was the book produced by Indres Naidoo and
Albie Sachs about conditions of Robben Island. It was necessary “to convey the meaning
of Robben Island through the experiences of one prisoner told extensively and
concretely”. In order to “finish the story as soon as possible”, to “do justice to it”, while
making it “as accurate and readable as possible”, Sachs and Naidoo worked together
“during [their] spare moments, working at nights and over weekends”. Together, they
58 R.K. Cope, Comrade Bill: The Life and Times of W H Andrews, Workersʹ Leader, Cape Town: Stewart
Printing Company, c.1943.
59 These auto/biographies included Albert Luthuli, Let My People Go: An Autobiography, Glasgow:
Collins Fount Paperbacks, 1987 (First published in 1962); Clements Kadalie, My Life and the ICU: The
Autobiography of a Black Trade Unionist, London, 1970; Helen Joseph, Side by Side, London: Zed Books,
1986; Labour and Community Resources Project (LACOM), Comrade Moss, Johannesburg: Learn and
Teach Publications, 1989; Doreen Musson, Johnny Gomas: Voice of the Working Class. A Political
Biography, Cape Town: Buchu Books, 1989. See also the biographical essay by Ray Alexander, ‘Johnny
Gomas as I Knew Him’, South African Labour Bulletin, Vol 15, No 5, January 1991, which fiercely
contested Musson’s characterisations.
60 Albert Luthuli, Let My People Go, p 15.
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