Requiem for Sophiatown by Can Themba

Requiem for Sophiatown Reviews

• 
  Tumelo Moleleki

  I found this book educational about Sophiatown and what happened to it all those years ago. I saw how women were seen by men and how they seemed so expendable. I felt some of the contempt black men felt towards black women because white women, by virtue of the immorality law, wre forbidden fruit to them and thus more alluring to the point where those women the law allowed them to have were debased and even ridiculed. It was thus a bittersweet read for me because I imagined myself as those women and living amid such hostility, a lot less subtle then. These conditions still prevail for women today. The story titled Dube Station, still fresh in my mind, was so horrid. The narrator observes a young woman being harassed, along with other male commuters and they do nothing to put a stop to it. Instead they are happy to move aside and allow the brute an unencumbered pursuit of his quarry at the time that the girl tries to get away.
• 
  Maryam Adhikarie

  It is dense and compelling to read. The bitterness of his characters in here shows but with understanding of how they got there. Of all the 25 short stories, each is atleast a bit remotely dark touching on themes of adultery, violence and alcohol during the times of Apartheid. These short stories are oddly satisfying because of the writing style. I am amazed that with each story I am thrown into a different pool of writing style and it feels like different people are writing each story.