Mhudi essay

Mhudi, as a character, is strong and resilient, often rebelling against many of the customs of her time. The circumstances of her life find her making new means of living, of surviving, and thus gaining reverence from her husband, who loves her unconditionally.

Critics point out that through the character of Mhudi, Plaatje describes his belief in the healing effect women exercise on race relations; another relationship in the novel, the friendship achieved between a native African and a Boer, has a similar significance.

Plaatje's novel Mhudi,set in an early period of South African history, also reflects his major thematic concerns. During the clash of several warring tribes and the onslaught of white Boer rule the heroine, Mhudi, and her lover Ra-Thaga, members of the same tribe, meet, undergo displacement and deprivation, and marry.

Mhudi, which was published in 1910, is indeed an old book. Said to be the “first full-length English novel by a black South African”, there are more than a hundred years between myself and the text.