Growing Up Black in White Supremacist South Africa: Down Second Avenue

Es'kia Mphahlele’s Down Second Avenue was a thrilling tale of growing up black in white supremacist South Africa. Moreover, I learned that marabi music, the earliest South African jazz from the townships, was created in Marabastad, a township of Pretoria where Mphahlele lived. Given to me by a South African woman from Cape Town who sees herself as having studied apartheid too much, gladly parted with the text. As someone whose only text dealing with apartheid was Kaffir Boy (which contains horrific scenes of discarded infants in trash heaps and child prostitution, leading to its banning in many US schools), Mphahlele’s story of an educated but impoverished black South African trying to transcend rigid racial hatred seems like an important precursor to the future narratives of blacks resisting apartheid. However, unlike what I recall of Kaffir Boy, Down Second Avenue contains surprisingly little information about key moments in the life of any young person, and also leaves out significant details about his personal life. For instance, how is it that he has a brother and a sister, but they are rarely discussed in any intimate way? Even later in life, when describing his marriage to Rebecca and their children, he never gives their names and his writings seems to suggest apathy to his progeny. But perhaps that general lack of description of loved ones and other moments in his adolescence reflect the psychological trauma he experienced, as well as bouts of depression, anger, restlessness, and the desire to leave, culminating in his move to Nigeria to teach. 

The novel also contained useful information regarding race relations between Indians and Blacks, as well as whites and blacks in Pretoria. The Afrikaans-speaking whites, unsurprisingly in Pretoria, tend to be more racist whereas the English whites and Europeans were more liberal. Indeed, Es’kia befriends many whites as well as some Coloureds during the course of his schooling and employment. Although at times mired in anger, he also knew very well that the only reason white supremacy could function so effectively in South Africa was with the complicity and active support of many non-whites, including the corrupt African policemen who actively protected pass laws and targeted other Blacks. Moreover, his account of his Aunt Dora’s fight with Abdool, the Indian shopkeeper, was also hilarious for the imagery of a heavyset woman publicly beating a man. The debates he represents between the ANC and the All Africa Convention were also interesting for the commentary among activists and leftists about a multiracial future for South Africa.

Overall, a fascinating account of a region of South Africa I knew little about, albeit written in a rather normative style. Perhaps the Capetonian who gave me the book was correct (as well as the author himself, who finds the style taken up by anti-apartheid writers as forced) in that much of the anti-apartheid literature becomes banal due to its proliferation and identical messages by authors who see themselves as bearers of a new message for racial harmony and progress. Indeed, I may have to return to Coetzee’s Life and Times of Michael K. for a good apartheid-era novel and discover some other works I have missed. Perhaps Nadine Gordimer is next on my list of authors, who is mentioned in Down Second Avenue.