ABOUT THE BOOK

This novel is Mongane Wally Serote's first since his acclaimed To Every Birth its Blood. It sets out to document the latter years of the liberation struggle in South Africa, and successfully conveys the bewilderment and uncertainty that were the experience of those involved in the historic events of the time. The overall impression is of a multitude of characters who enter the pages in an apparently random manner and then, inexplicably, disappear again. This intriguing device gives a sense of the mood of those days, when people really did come and go, frequently disappearing without explanation or trace.

Gods of Our Time is a challenging and enriching experience, one that fills an important gap in South Africa's history, and, in many ways, exemplifies the shifts in novel-writing itself in this country.

Mongane Wally Serote was born in Sophiatown on 8 may 1944. He received his early education in Alexandra Township and later attended the Morris Isaacson High School in Soweto. In 1974, after a succession of different jobs, he left South Africa on a Fullbright scholarship, which enabled him to study for a Master of Fine Arts at Columbia University in New York. Before leaving he had been awarded the Ingrid Jonker Prize for Poetry following the publication of his collection Yakhal'inkomo.

In 1977 Serote settled in Gaborone, Botswana, where he rejoined the ANC underground and MK. After being assigned to different positions in the ANC, including being the founder head of MEDU-Art Ensemble and the ANC Cultural Attaché in Britain and Europe, he returned to South Africa in 1990 and was appointed to Head of the Department of arts and Culture of the ANC in Johannesburg. In 1991 he was endowed with an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Natal. He won the Noma Award for Publishing in Africa in 1993. Mongane Serote was elected to parliament in 1994 and to the chair of the Arts, Culture, Language, Science and Technology Parliamentary Portfolio committee.