![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Yet, despite achieving a fairly high score for English in my final exams, I still wasn’t sure I understood how the stories might have anything to do with me. My impression of Shakespeare improved slightly in high school, (solely because my English teacher was also my drama teacher so, at the very least, I was given the opportunity to hear the plays spoken aloud). I understood the Bard to be a man who wrote archaic stories of a removed time, place and context that couldn’t possibly resemble my own in any way. I felt it was something reserved for the elite. Growing up, my associations and ideas around what Shakespeare was, was that it was a fancy way of speaking that only rich white people could access. Point being- I never thought I would ever “understand” Shakespeare let alone perform or teach it. Two years ago, I got the opportunity (Brett Goldin Bursary) to do an acting residency at the Royal Shakespeare Company. ![]() Thereby giving us direct access to it, even before Bantu education was implemented in South Africa. The discovery fundamentally shifted my perceptions of Shakespeare’s words and its potential for two simple reasons I could attempt to read the story in my mothers tongue and Sol Plaatje, a POC, had taken care to translate what I at the time, perceived to be a ‘white story’ into Setswana. During the process ,I discovered “Dintshontsho Tsa Bo-Julius Kesara” (Julius Caesar) by William Shakespeare, translated into Setswana by Sol Plaatje, published by Wits Press in 1937. Post-funeral, I sat in her garage in grief and began archiving what I could of a giants life. Three years after she handed me the book, she passed on. Her name scribbled on the first page along with what it cost, R1,00. Shakespeare Grounded: Translating Shakespeare within a South African Context:įive years ago, my grandmother handed me a copy of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare –her own copy from her school days. ![]()
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