Keep the Ship Moving!

Description

In this memoir of the 1970s in New Brighton – the largest black township built by the
apartheid system outside Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth) – family relations and the development
of the writer’s political consciousness and organizing abilities at the American-owned Ford
Motor Company factory take centre stage. Lyrical and often colloquial, sprinkling his English
narrative with isiXhosa, Mpumelelo Cilibe gives us a vivid and very honest picture, both of
his personal life and his role as a leading regional activist. Irrespective of where he found
himself, he always maintained his independence of thought and action, and by the late
1980s, noting the problematic behaviour of many activists who were ensnared by the
apartheid authorities, elected to largely withdraw from political life. The social and literary
power of this work thus lies in its description of the challenges of growing up in a period of
growing resistance to white rule and shows how a resolute individual navigated extreme
currents in order to make a contribution to the general struggle and yet keep his personal
integrity.