Amazwi South African Museum of Literature - Crystal Warren (Curatorial Division)

From a single shelf in the Rhodes University Library to a national cultural institution housing 111,000 manuscripts - discover the remarkable story of the Amazwi South African Museum of Literature. In this video, Crystal Warren, Manager of the Curatorial Division at Amazwi, takes us on a journey through the museum’s rich history. Founded through the foresight of poet and academic, Guy Butler, Amazwi has grown into a multilingual, inclusive archive of South Africa’s literary heritage. Explore how manuscripts, letters, typewriters, portraits, and even theatre programmes come together to tell the nation’s stories. With rare insights into authors like Olive Schreiner, Tatamkhulu Afrika, Sindiwe Magona, and J.M. Coetzee, this is more than a museum - it’s a living tribute to South African creativity and resilience.

Further Reading

Tatamkhulu Afrika, Bitter Eden (Arcadia, 2002)

Amazwi Website: https://www.amazwi.museum/

Guy Butler, A Local Habitation: An Autobiography 1945-90 (New Africa Books, 1991)

J.M. Coetzee, Dusklands (Ravan, 1974)

J.M. Coetzee, The Pole and Other Stories (Liveright, 2023)

Sindiwe Magona, To My Children’s Children (David Philip, 1990)

---, Mother to Mother (David Philip, 1998)

Olive Schreiner, The Story of An African Farm (1883; Oxford University Press, 1998)