Reprisals of modernity in black South African 'mission' writing

The essay challenges the strongly teleological emphasis in the construction of black South African literary history, which has elided many of the aest hetic, historical and political complexities of the literature . It argues that many of the literary texts written in the 'mission' ethos are marked b y forms of aesthetic hybridity and subtextual ambiguity which require serio us interpretation. A common feature of this writing is its desperate strugg le,vith a sense of accelerated rime. It is suggested that written narrative was undertaken as a mode of reprisal which sought to limit and, in some in stances, transform the effects of an alien mortality. This undertaking is s tudied in two groups of texts: those which tell the story of Christian 'eme rgence' amongst indigenous communities, and those which re-create the tradi tional past. In the case of the 'Christian' texts, the subtext is found to be more secular than is often assumed, with writers using the theme to deve lop art active I relationship with the historical Effects and ideological c ontent of modernity. Similarly, narrative about traditional society (or ear ly colonial encounters) involve attempts to relocate modern Il subjects in revised versions of the past, or to elicit principles around which alternat ive models of modernity of even civil society might develop.