Apartheid Activist and Poet Dies
Dennis Brutus, a South African exiled for his activism against apartheid, died Saturday morning at his Cape Town home in his sleep. He had been battling prostate cancer for some time. He was 85.
Born in 1924, Brutus was an impassioned scholar who spent many years in prison for the political beliefs he held, specifically his anti-apartheid stance. As a result, Brutus was forced to spend more than 20 years outside his native country during which he used the time to travel the world writing and teaching.
Patrick Bond, director of the Center for Civil Society at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, remembers Brutus:
The memory of Dennis Brutus will remain everywhere there is struggle against injustice. Uniquely courageous, consistent and principled, Brutus bridged the global and local, politics and culture, class and race, the old and the young, the red and green. He was an emblem of solidarity with all those peoples oppressed and environments wrecked by the power of capital and state elites…But given his role as a world-class poet, Brutus showed that social justice advocates can have both bread and roses.
Brutus is survived by his wife, two sisters, eight children, nine grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
[photo: fuzheado]
Tags: activist, apartheid, Dennis Brutus, poet, prostate cancer, South Africa