Rallying to a cause: the plays of Zakes Mda 1979-1989

Zakes Mda, dubbed one of South Africa's most prolific playwrights, produced his richest and most powerful theatre work during the 70s and 80s. Ironically, it is only in the 90s that he has been acknowledged in his own country as one of its foremost dramatists - ironic since he has recently moved away from drama into the realms of fiction. Fortunately Mda has accumulated a worthy canon of dramatic works, spanning radio and film, as well as theatre, and there is no reason to believe that he will not return to play writing. Mda has worked extensively in theatre in various capacities but most notably in the area of theatre-for-development. For example, he worked as director with Maratholi Travelling Theatre in Lesotho, an experience which contributed, in part, towards his book "When People Play People: Development Communication Through Theatre". Mda's plays have been produced in the United States, Britain, Spain, France and Russia as well as in southern Africa. "The Nun's Romantic Story" has been translated into Castilian and Catalan and "We Shall Sing for the Fatherland" and "Dark Voices Ring" have both been translated into Russian and French. In South Africa he won the Merit Award of the Amstel Playwright of the Year Society for "We Shall Sing for the Fatherland" in 1978 and in 1979 he was Amstel Playright of the Year for "The Hill". For his novel "She Plays with the Darkness", he won the Sanlam Literary Award in 1995.