Beloved Small shifted boundaries of literature

Francesca Villette

PROFESSOR Adam Small has shifted the boundaries of South African literature, enhanced the Afrikaans language and spoken out about issues others hesitated to address and, in so doing, become a voice for the voiceless.

This was said by staff at Stellenbosch University of Small, as he is one of several professionals who will receive honorary degrees from the university next month, along with statistician-general Pali Lehohla, veteran political economist and legendary academic Sampie Terreblanche, academic, jurist, campaigner for human rights and judge of the Constitutional Court, Justice Edwin Cameron and internationally renowned jurist, campaigner for women’s rights and gender equality, and also judge of the Constitutional Court, Justice Kate O’Regan.

“As an academic, poet and playwright, Small has fearlessly addressed the burning issues of apartheid South Africa, proving himself to be a revolutionary thinker,” the university said.

His poetry collections include Kitaar my Kruis(1961), Sê Sjibbolet(1963) and Oos Wes Tuis Bes, Distrik Ses(1973).

“As such, with a distinctive Christian influence and love as guiding principle, Small has ‘written himself into’ the very being of the South African nation as our compass and moral conscience. His latest Afrikaans volume, Klawerjas, appeared in 2013. In theatre, his 1965 play Kanna Hy Kô Hystoe remains an undisputable highlight in Afrikaans literature.”

Small also pioneered writing in Kaaps – a language spoken mostly by coloured people in Cape Town.

Small said he was particularly pleased about the university acknowledging his renewal of the Afrikaans language intellectually, “in revolutionary manner”, breaking through to things “previously suppressed”.

Small was not allowed to study at the university as an undergraduate because of apartheid.

His alma mater is UCT. “I feel very pleased with and privileged to receive this award, especially in that it comes from the University of Stellenbosch. As a young undergraduate student, and also post-graduate, I did not study at the US since, due to apartheid, I could not do so at the time,” Small said.

He added that he was pleased to be sharing the honour with, among others, the Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman and Japie van Zyl, a leader in space engineering.

Small studied languages, philosophy and moral philosophy at UCT, the London School of Economics and the University of Oxford.

“As academic at the UWC in the 1960s and 1970s, his strong sense of justice… was evident. He resigned as professor of Philosophy in solidarity with students who were forced to leave campus. Later, back at UWC, he strived to lay a strong intellectual foundation for the training of social workers, and developed a community-based philosophy of care,” SU said.

“Above all, however, Small is nationally recognised as beloved and acclaimed poet and playwright, who used his work to poignantly comment on the destructive apartheid system.”

francesca.villette@inl.co.za

@francescaJaneV