Noni Jabavu
Noni Jabavu | |
|---|---|
| Born | Helen Nontando Jabavu 20 August 1919 Middledrift, Eastern Cape, South Africa |
| Died | 19 June 2008 (aged 88) Lynette Elliott Frail Care Home in Selborne, East London, Eastern Cape, South Africa |
| Nationality | South African |
| Occupation(s) | Writer, journalist and editor |
| Notable work | Drawn in Colour (1960); The Ochre People (1963) |
| Spouse(s) | Michael Cadbury Crosfield, m. 1951 |
| Parent(s) | Davidson Don Tengo Jabavu and Thandiswa Florence Makiwane |
| Relatives | John Tengo Jabavu (grandfather); Cecilia Makiwane (maternal aunt) |
Helen Nontando (Noni) Jabavu (20 August 1919 – 19 June 2008) was a South African writer and journalist, one of the first African women to pursue a successful literary career and the first black South African woman to publish books of autobiography. Educated in Britain from the age of 13, she became the first African woman to be the editor of a British literary magazine when in 1961 she took on the editorship of The New Strand, a revived version of The Strand Magazine, which had closed in 1950.
In the words of poet Makhosazana Xaba: "One only has to read her two books (Drawn in Colour and The Ochre People) to realize just how skilled she was as a memoirist. Her journalistic column editorials demonstrate a reflective style that must have been unusual for her times. While interviewing Wally Serote who was living in Botswana during the same time as Noni, I learned something that confirmed my initial thoughts on her. 'We men, she said, did not know how to relate to her (Noni). She was a woman living far ahead of our times.' This speaks volumes considering Serote himself is a world-wise literary and cultural giant."