# Es'kia Mphahlele
**Es'kia Mphahlele** (born Ezekiel Mphahlele, 17 December 1919, Pretoria; died in Lebowakgomo in 2008) was a South African writer, teacher, and editor whose memoir *[Down Second Avenue](https://www.edgepedia.org/down-second-avenue)* (1959) became a landmark of South African literature and whose twenty years of exile made him a central figure in African letters on three continents[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele) • [2](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/01/world/africa/01mphahlele.html). He was nominated for the [Nobel Prize in Literature](https://www.edgepedia.org/nobel-prize-in-literature) in 1968, and his memoir has been translated into several foreign languages, though not into any indigenous South African African language[3](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele). One assessment calls him the "Dean of the New African Movement", the link between that movement's intellectual culture and post-apartheid public life[4](http://pzacad.pitzer.edu/NAM/general/essays/mphahleleA.pdf).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born / died | 17 December 1919, Pretoria; died in Lebowakgomo in 2008, aged 88[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele) • [2](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/01/world/africa/01mphahlele.html) |
| Teaching ban | Banned from teaching anywhere in South Africa in 1952 after protesting the Bantu Education Act[5](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele) |
| Drum years | Political reporter, sub-editor, and fiction editor at *Drum*, 1955–57[3](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele) |
| Exile | Left for Lagos in 1957; twenty years across six countries on three continents[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/) |
| Chemchemi | Founder and director of the Chemchemi Cultural Centre, Nairobi, 1963–65[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/) |
| Censorship | *Down Second Avenue* banned in South Africa in 1966; ban lifted December 1978[7](https://www.banned-books.org/books/down-second-avenue) |
| Return | Returned aged 57 in 1977 and dropped the name Ezekiel for Es'kia[8](https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/nov/24/obituary-eskia-mphahlele-uncle-zeke) |
| Honors | Nobel Prize nomination 1968; Order of the Southern Cross from Nelson Mandela[3](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele) |
## Early life and education
The memoir that made his name portrays two childhood worlds: Maupaneng, a small village outside Pietersburg, and Marabastad, a location in Pretoria, where he showed academic promise that led to a teaching career[9](https://www.panmacmillan.co.za/authors/eskia-mphahlele/down-2nd-avenue/9781770100077). He taught English and [Afrikaans](https://www.edgepedia.org/afrikaans) at Orlando High School in [Johannesburg](https://www.edgepedia.org/johannesburg) from 1945 to 1952[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele).
**The 1952 ban.** His protest against the introduction of the Bantu Education Act ended his school-teaching career: he was banned from teaching anywhere in South Africa[5](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele). To support his wife Rebecca and three small children he worked first as a messenger and then as a reporter on *Drum* magazine, a career not of his choosing. Difficulties tied to the banning led to a brief exile in Lesotho in 1954, and to the prolonged exile that began in 1957[10](https://doi.org/10.17159/2309-9070/tvl.v.46i1.4296).
## Drum years and early writing
At *Drum* he held the posts of political reporter, sub-editor, and fiction editor at various stages[3](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele). One account describes the 1955–57 stint as unhappy, combining reporting and editing at *African Drum* with MA study, but supplying raw material for much of his later writing[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/). *Drum* published his short stories and put him in contact with other rising writers, including the young [Nadine Gordimer](https://www.edgepedia.org/nadine-gordimer)[8](https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/nov/24/obituary-eskia-mphahlele-uncle-zeke). The story collection *Man Must Live* appeared in 1947[11](https://mg.co.za/friday/2008-11-07-leaving-the-forefront-of-african-lit/).
## Banning and exile
He left South Africa with his family for Lagos in 1957, beginning a twenty-year odyssey through six countries on three continents[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/). In Nigeria he taught in a high school for fifteen months, then in the University of Ibadan's extension program[5](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele).
**Paris and Nairobi.** In 1961 he moved to Paris to head the African Program of the Congress for Cultural Freedom, and worked with *Présence Africaine*, the central literary organ of the [Négritude](https://www.edgepedia.org/negritude) movement[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/) • [4](http://pzacad.pitzer.edu/NAM/general/essays/mphahleleA.pdf). In 1963 he founded the Chemchemi (Swahili for "fountain") Cultural Centre in Nairobi, a sister institute to the Mbari Writers' and Artists' Club he had helped found in Ibadan in 1961, and directed it from 1963 to 1965[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/) • [5](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele). The mid-1960s exposure of the Congress for Cultural Freedom as a CIA front placed this phase of his career in a complicated light[3](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele).
**The United States and Zambia.** He earned a doctorate at the [University of Denver](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-denver) in 1968, and in the early 1970s taught there[2](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/01/world/africa/01mphahlele.html).
**Censorship at home.** In 1966 *Down Second Avenue* was banned in South Africa at national level for political content, following his listing under the Internal Security Act; the ban was lifted in December 1978 after he was delisted[7](https://www.banned-books.org/books/down-second-avenue). His worldwide reception had drawn attention to South Africa's drift toward racial oppression and isolation, and led to his works being banned until 1978[13](https://mg.co.za/article/2015-10-09-00-eskias-music-plays-on/). One literary account gives a conflicting 1988 date for the end of the ban[12](https://literatureatlas.com/autobiography/down-second-avenue/); the archival censorship record dates the lifting to December 1978.
## Return and academic career
After a brief, invigorating return in 1976 to address the inaugural conference of the Black Studies Institute, he applied for a passport to relocate permanently, ending two decades of exile in 1977[14](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/mphahleles-writing-in-the-whirlwind/A7532968CC7A198BC8A063334DE7058A). He returned in the wake of the 1976 Soweto revolt and, with [Steve Biko](https://www.edgepedia.org/steve-biko)'s black consciousness movement in the ascendant, dropped the name Ezekiel and settled on Es'kia[8](https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/nov/24/obituary-eskia-mphahlele-uncle-zeke). The return divided opinion sharply; he defended it on the ground that exile had become a form of silence and the work had to be done at home[12](https://literatureatlas.com/autobiography/down-second-avenue/).
At the [University of the Witwatersrand](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-the-witwatersrand) he became professor of [African literature](https://www.edgepedia.org/african-literature); sources differ on the dates, one giving 1979–87[1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele), another that he founded the department of African literature at Wits in 1983 and headed it from 1983 to 1987[5](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele) • [11](https://mg.co.za/friday/2008-11-07-leaving-the-forefront-of-african-lit/).
**Late works.** *Chirundu* (1979), a novel about the abuse of power drawing on his Zambian experience, was only the second of his full-length works published in South Africa, following the lifting of a ban on his works[6](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/). His bibliography also includes *Father Come Home* (1984) and *Bury Me at the Marketplace: Selected Letters 1943–1980* (1984, edited by N. Chabani Manganyi)[11](https://mg.co.za/friday/2008-11-07-leaving-the-forefront-of-african-lit/) • [1](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele). He had the distinction of writing two autobiographies, *Down Second Avenue*, which focuses on his early life, and *Afrika My Music*[16](https://citylifearts.co.za/celebrated-south-africa-writer-eskia-mphahleles-iconic-book-down-second-avenue-grows-new-legs-up-the-stage/). One scholarly chapter dates *Afrika, My Music* to 1986[15](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/unhoming-and-the-uncanny-the-autobiographical-eskia-mphahlele/4307737CFC1862DB173E90E936F4B06A); the discrepancy is unresolved here.
## Ideas: African humanism and the Négritude debate
In Paris from 1961 to 1963 he became acquainted with the proponents of Négritude, but rejected its exoticism, holding, like [Frantz Fanon](https://www.edgepedia.org/frantz-fanon), that there is "no single political context for Africa"[8](https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/nov/24/obituary-eskia-mphahlele-uncle-zeke). Abroad, *Down Second Avenue* established him as a central figure in the Négritude debate, which he attacked as a romanticism that Africans in Africa did not need[12](https://literatureatlas.com/autobiography/down-second-avenue/). He judged the movement possibly relevant only in largely homogeneous black countries, not multiracial South Africa, yet this did not prevent a permanent intellectual friendship with Senghor built on a shared "African Humanism"[4](http://pzacad.pitzer.edu/NAM/general/essays/mphahleleA.pdf). His first intellectual circle in Lagos included the *Black Orpheus* editorial board: [Chinua Achebe](https://www.edgepedia.org/chinua-achebe), Wole Soyinka, J.P. Clark, [Gabriel Okara](https://www.edgepedia.org/gabriel-okara), and Christopher Okigbo[4](http://pzacad.pitzer.edu/NAM/general/essays/mphahleleA.pdf).
**African humanism.** His African humanism was a uniquely black South African expression of cultural nationalism, shaped by his pan-African and cross-continental wanderings. In the last years of exile he formulated his signature phrase, "the tyranny of place", articulating his compulsion to return to the land of his birth[14](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/mphahleles-writing-in-the-whirlwind/A7532968CC7A198BC8A063334DE7058A).
**Re-reading the memoirs.** Scholarship now treats *Down Second Avenue* (1959), *Afrika, My Music* and Manganyi's 1983 biography *Exiles and Homecomings* as a linked corpus for analyzing unhoming and the uncanny[15](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/unhoming-and-the-uncanny-the-autobiographical-eskia-mphahlele/4307737CFC1862DB173E90E936F4B06A). Recent work also revises the simple "protest literature" reading of *Down Second Avenue* and Modisane's *Blame Me on History* (1963), arguing that their stylistic innovations problematize linear temporality and refashion modern black subjectivity[17](https://doi.org/10.1177/0021989418766664).
## References
1. [Es'kia Mphahlele, Encyclopedia.com](https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/south-african-literature-biographies/eskia-mphahlele)
2. [Es'kia Mphahlele, Chronicler of Apartheid, Dies at 88, The New York Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/01/world/africa/01mphahlele.html)
3. [Es'kia Mphahlele, South African History Online](https://sahistory.org.za/people/eskia-mphahlele)
4. [Ezekiel Mphahlele: An Appreciation (1919–2008), New African Movement essay](http://pzacad.pitzer.edu/NAM/general/essays/mphahleleA.pdf)
5. [Es'kia Mphahlele, African Studies Centre Leiden](https://www.ascleiden.nl/content/library-weekly/eskia-mphahlele)
6. [Ezekiel Mphahlele, EBSCO Research Starters](https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/biography/ezekiel-mphahlele/)
7. [Down Second Avenue, Banned in South Africa, Banned Books archive](https://www.banned-books.org/books/down-second-avenue)
8. [Es'kia Mphahlele obituary, The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/nov/24/obituary-eskia-mphahlele-uncle-zeke)
9. [Down 2nd Avenue, Pan Macmillan South Africa](https://www.panmacmillan.co.za/authors/eskia-mphahlele/down-2nd-avenue/9781770100077)
10. [The intersection of experience, imaginative writing and meaning-making in Es'kia Mphahlele](https://doi.org/10.17159/2309-9070/tvl.v.46i1.4296)
11. [Leaving the forefront of African lit, Mail & Guardian](https://mg.co.za/friday/2008-11-07-leaving-the-forefront-of-african-lit/)
12. [Down Second Avenue, Literature Atlas](https://literatureatlas.com/autobiography/down-second-avenue/)
13. [Es'kia's music plays on, Mail & Guardian](https://mg.co.za/article/2015-10-09-00-eskias-music-plays-on/)
14. [Mphahlele's Writing in the Whirlwind, Foundational African Writers, Cambridge University Press](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/mphahleles-writing-in-the-whirlwind/A7532968CC7A198BC8A063334DE7058A)
15. [(Un)homing and the Uncanny: The (Auto)biographical Es'kia Mphahlele, Cambridge University Press](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/foundational-african-writers/unhoming-and-the-uncanny-the-autobiographical-eskia-mphahlele/4307737CFC1862DB173E90E936F4B06A)
16. [Down Second Avenue grows new legs up the stage, CityLife Arts](https://citylifearts.co.za/celebrated-south-africa-writer-eskia-mphahleles-iconic-book-down-second-avenue-grows-new-legs-up-the-stage/)
17. [Writing against innocence: Entangled temporality, black subjectivity, and Drum writers revisited](https://doi.org/10.1177/0021989418766664)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Literature and written works › Writers and literary biographies › Fiction writers: novelists and genre › Asian, African, and world novelists › Surnames Ll to Y › Surnames Mo to Ou*
*Initially written Oct 10, 2026 · Edited: Oct 11, 2026; Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026*
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