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<font size=3>I am blessed to have had Dennis Brutus as a professor and
friend. Though I'd had some modest success with my writing before meeting
him, being in his classes and receiving his critiques were formative in
my development of a writer. He was a generous teacher, though he
did NOT coddle writers. He celebrated craft, content and integrity.
He brilliantly modeled for us and laid rest to the erroneous notion that
art and life were separate and distinct. For him art, life and
activism were synonymous. Welcome this beloved ancestor.<br><br>
PATRICK BOND WRITES.....<br><br>
One of SA's best loved Marxists, Dennis Brutus, performed 'Marx in
Soho'<br>
- set in South Africa - and we will be posting a video of it at some
point.<br><br>
Dennis left us this morning, surrounded by loving relatives, without<br>
pain. His final period in Durban, about six weeks ago, reminded all
of<br>
us of the courage and 'stubborn hope' - and of the need not to
mourn,<br>
too long, but to celebrate. If anyone would like to assist with<br>
memorials, in whatever city and setting, please let us know; events
will<br>
be announced in coming days. There will also be a website to post
the<br>
photos Dennis loved so much, and we'll try to have videos of Dennis<br>
online for posterity. Mainly, keep struggling for justice, in honour
of<br>
his politics, and keep expressing, in honour of Dennis' contribution
to<br>
culture and inspiration. And keep enjoying every minute no matter
how<br>
grim the enemy and the circumstances, as he always insisted. Patrick<br>
(presently at 1 510 525 4802)<br><br>
<br>
Statement from the Brutus Family on the passing of Professor Dennis
Brutus<br><br>
Professor Dennis Brutus died quietly in his sleep on the 26th
December,<br>
earlier this morning. He is survived by his wife May, his sisters
Helen<br>
and Dolly, eight children, nine grandchildren and four<br>
great-grandchildren in Hong Kong, England, the USA and Cape
Town.<br><br>
Dennis lived his life as so many would wish to, in service to the
causes<br>
of justice, peace, freedom and the protection of the planet. He
remained<br>
positive about the future, believing that popular movements will
achieve<br>
their aims.<br><br>
Dennis' poetry, particularly of his prison experiences on Robben
Island,<br>
has been taught in schools around the world. He was modest about his<br>
work, always trying to improve on his drafts.<br><br>
His creativity crossed into other areas of his life, he used poetry
to<br>
mobilize, to inspire others to action, also to bring joy.<br><br>
We wish to thank all the doctors, nurses and staff who provided<br>
excellent care for Dennis in his final months, and to also thank St<br>
Luke's Hospice for their assistance.<br><br>
There will be a private cremation within a few days and arrangements
for<br>
a thanks giving service will be made known in early January.<br><br>
***<br><br>
Dennis Vincent Brutus, 1924-2009<br><br>
World-renowned political organizer and one of Africa's most
celebrated<br>
poets, Dennis Brutus, died early on December 26 in Cape Town, in his<br>
sleep, aged 85.<br><br>
Even in his last days, Brutus was fully engaged, advocating social<br>
protest against those responsible for climate change, and promoting<br>
reparations to black South Africans from corporations that benefited<br>
from apartheid. He was a leading plaintiff in the Alien Tort Claims
Act<br>
case against major firms that is now making progress in the US court
system.<br><br>
Brutus was born in Harare in 1924, but his South African parents
soon<br>
moved to Port Elizabeth where he attended Paterson and Schauderville<br>
High Schools. He entered Fort Hare University on a full scholarship
in<br>
1940, graduating with a distinction in English and a second major in<br>
Psychology. Further studies in law at the University of the<br>
Witwatersrand were cut short by imprisonment for anti-apartheid
activism.<br><br>
Brutus' political activity initially included extensive journalistic<br>
reporting, organising with the Teachers' League and Congress
movement,<br>
and leading the new South African Sports Association as an
alternative<br>
to white sports bodies. After his banning in 1961 under the
Suppression<br>
of Communism Act, he fled to Mozambique but was captured and deported
to<br>
Johannesburg. There, in 1963, Brutus was shot in the back while<br>
attempting to escape police custody. Memorably, it was in front of
Anglo<br>
American Corporation headquarters that he nearly died while awaiting
an<br>
ambulance reserved for blacks.<br><br>
While recovering, he was held in the Johannesburg Fort Prison cell
which<br>
more than a half-century earlier housed Mahatma Gandhi. Brutus was<br>
transferred to Robben Island where he was jailed in the cell next to<br>
Nelson Mandela, and in 1964-65 wrote the collections Sirens Knuckles<br>
Boots and Letters to Martha, two of the richest poetic expressions
of<br>
political incarceration.<br><br>
Subsequently forced into exile, Brutus resumed simultaneous careers as
a<br>
poet and anti-apartheid campaigner in London, and while working for
the<br>
International Defense and Aid Fund, was instrumental in achieving
the<br>
apartheid regime's expulsion from the 1968 Mexican Olympics and then
in<br>
1970 from the Olympic movement.<br><br>
Upon moving to the US in 1977, Brutus served as a professor of<br>
literature and African studies at Northwestern (Chicago) and
Pittsburgh,<br>
and defeated high-profile efforts by the Reagan Administration to
deport<br>
him during the early 1980s. He wrote numerous poems, ninety of which<br>
will be published posthumously next year by Worcester State
University,<br>
and he helped organize major African writers organizations with his<br>
colleagues Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe.<br><br>
Following the political transition in South Africa, Brutus resumed<br>
activities with grassroots social movements in his home country. In
the<br>
late 1990s he also became a pivotal figure in the global justice<br>
movement and a featured speaker each year at the World Social Forum,
as<br>
well as at protests against the World Trade Organisation, G8,
Bretton<br>
Woods Institutions and the New Partnership for Africa's
Development.<br><br>
Brutus continued to serve in the anti-racism, reparations and
economic<br>
justice movements as a leading strategist until his death, calling
in<br>
August for the 'Seattling' of the recent Copenhagen summit because<br>
sufficient greenhouse gas emissions cuts and North-South 'climate
debt'<br>
payments were not on the agenda.<br><br>
His final academic appointment was as Honorary Professor at the<br>
University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society, and for that<br>
university's press and Haymarket Press, he published the<br>
autobiographical Poetry and Protest in 2006.<br><br>
Amongst numerous recent accolades were the US War Resisters League
peace<br>
award in September, two Doctor of Literature degrees conferred at
Rhodes<br>
and Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University in April - following six<br>
other honorary doctorates - and the Lifetime Achievement Award of
the<br>
South African government Department of Arts and Culture in 2008.<br><br>
Brutus was also awarded membership in the South African Sports Hall
of<br>
Fame in 2007, but rejected it on grounds that the institution had
not<br>
confronted the country's racist history. He also won the Paul
Robeson<br>
and Langston Hughes awards.<br><br>
The memory of Dennis Brutus will remain everywhere there is struggle<br>
against injustice. Uniquely courageous, consistent and principled,<br>
Brutus bridged the global and local, politics and culture, class and<br>
race, the old and the young, the red and green. He was an emblem of<br>
solidarity with all those peoples oppressed and environments wrecked
by<br>
the power of capital and state elites - hence some in the African<br>
National Congress government labeled him 'ultraleft'. But given his
role<br>
as a world-class poet, Brutus showed that social justice advocates
can<br>
have both bread and roses.<br><br>
Brutus's poetry collections are:<br>
* Sirens Knuckles and Boots (Mbari Productions, Ibaden, Nigeria and<br>
Northwestern University Press, Evanston Illinois, 1963).<br>
* Letters to Martha and Other Poems from a South African Prison<br>
(Heinemann, Oxford, 1968).<br>
* Poems from Algiers (African and Afro-American Studies and Research<br>
Institute, Austin, Texas, 1970).<br>
* A Simple Lust (Heinemann, Oxford, 1973).<br>
* China Poems (African and Afro-American Studies and Research
Centre,<br>
Austin, Texas, 1975).<br>
* Strains (Troubador Press, Del Valle, Texas).<br>
* Stubborn Hope (Three Continents Press, Washington, DC and
Heinemann,<br>
Oxford, 1978).<br>
* Salutes and Censures (Fourth Dimension, Enugu, Nigeria, 1982).<br>
* Airs and Tributes (Whirlwind Press, Camden, New Jersey, 1989).<br>
* Still the Sirens (Pennywhistle Press, Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1993).<br>
* Remembering Soweto, ed. Lamont B. Steptoe (Whirlwind Press,
Camden,<br>
New Jersey, 2004).<br>
* Leafdrift, ed. Lamont B. Steptoe (Whirlwind Press, Camden, New
Jersey,<br>
2005).<br>
* Poetry and Protest: A Dennis Brutus Reader, ed. Aisha Kareem and
Lee<br>
Sustar (Haymarket Books, Chicago and University of KwaZulu-Natal
Press,<br>
Pietermaritzburg, 2006).<br><br>
He is survived by his wife May, his sisters Helen and Dolly, eight<br>
children, nine grandchildren and four great-grandchildren in Hong
Kong,<br>
England, the USA and Cape Town.<br><br>
(By Patrick Bond)<br><br>
<br><br>
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