Thanks for visiting our website.

To communicate with us about information on this website email us at: info@achmatdangor.co.za

To find out more about the Achmat Dangor Literary Prize, contact Stacy Hardy at: stacy.hardy@wits.ac.za

The Achmat Dangor Legacy Project (ADLP) is an initiative of Audrey Elster, Achmat’s wife and partner of 30 years. In designing the ADLP we have been inspired and supported by many people. And it is to all of them that we wish to express our appreciation. First of all, we would like to appreciate Achmat for the extraordinary life that he led. We hope this project does justice to his many achievements and serves as an inspiration for others to follow. Many conversations took place in the conceptualising of the ADLP and we would like to single out Jean de la Harpe; Paul Weinberg and Justine Dangor for encouraging us and helping to bring it to life; Vuyiswa Sidzumo, Darren Walker, and Martin Abregu from the Ford Foundation; Verne Harris and Razia Saleh from NMF and Lauren Segal.

In creating the Achmat Dangor Literary Prize we appreciate the guidance offered by Ronit Frenkel; Isabel Hofmeyr; Isobel Dixon and special thanks to Terry Morris and Prof Ivan Vladislavić. Special thanks are also due to Thabiso Mahlape of Blackbird Books for managing the first Achmat Dangor Literary Prize. We would also like to acknowledge Nirox Foundation for hosting the first winner, Laila Manack, as part of the writing retreat attached to the 2023 prize. Wits Creative Writing of the School of Literature, Language and Media in the Faculty of Humanities will be managing the Book Prize in years to come and a big thank you to Stacy Hardy for leading the process.

In building the oral history collection our deepest gratitude goes to our interviewees for generously sharing their memories of Achmat and offering keen insights into his life and times: Abbas Dangor; Justine Dangor; Mohammed Dangor; Moosa Dangor; Zachary Dangor; Zane Dangor; Jean de la Harpe; Audrey Elster; Maeline Engelbrecht; Patrick Flusk; Verne Harris; Horst Kleinschmidt; Glenn Moss; Prof Peter Piot; Dr Mamphela Ramphele; the late Gadija Richards and her son Muneer Richards; Buyisile Sishuba; Oliver Schmitz; Dr Annari van der Merwe; Prof Ivan Vladislavić; Darren Walker; Paul Weinberg and a special thanks to Prof Ariel Dorfman for preparing a statement and to his son Rodrigo for filming it. Thanks are due to Joan Appel for drafting verbatim transcripts of the zoom recordings of interviews conducted for the project. The oral history component was developed by Dr Katie Mooney and Audrey.

Achmat’s private papers were sorted by Audrey and donated to Historical Papers Research Archives (HPRA) at the University of the Witwatersrand. Our gratitude to all the staff involved in the processing and archiving the Achmat Dangor Papers including Gabrielle Mohale and Elizabeth Marima at HPRA. Special thanks are due to the Nelson Mandela Foundation (NMF) for digitising the papers and to Razia Saleh and her team Zandile Myeka, Sophia Duiker and Athenkosi Sigenu for undertaking the work.

In conducting research about Achmat’s life and historical moments or contexts which he lived through, we are indebted to the accumulated knowledge of the research community. We wish to express thanks to academics, journalists and researchers that had the opportunity of interviewing Achmat himself and for making the transcripts accessible to all on the Web including Aghogho Akpome; Yvette Christiansë; Jansie Kotze and Ruth Harris; Jean Meiring; Andries Olifant; and Elaine Young as well as Karen Hurt; Andrew van der Vliet; and Nancy Richards whose transcripts are part of Audrey’s Private Collection. We drew on the research of many more academics as listed in the sources cited on the website and thanks to them. We also consulted a range of sources on many websites such as African Activist Archive; Africa South Arts Initiative; AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power; Digital Innovation South Africa; Johannesburg Review of Books; Mandela Rhodes Foundation; Nelson Mandela Foundation; South African History Archive; South African History Online and UNAIDS. Special mention needs to be made of two events that proved an incredibly rich source of information about Achmat’s life: the memorial for Achmat hosted by the Mandela Legacy organisations and the family in September 2020 and the tribute for Achmat hosted by the Johannesburg Review Books in November 2021. We have quoted extensively from contributions made at these events by the Coco Cachalia; Justine Dangor; Zachary Dangor; the late Jessie Duarte; Mandla Langa; Graça Machel; the late Don Mattera; Sibongile Mkhabela; Father Smangaliso Mkhatshwa; Nicolette Naylor; Prof Njabulo Ndebele; Kim Porteus; Prof Hein Willemse and Prof Ivan Vladislavić. The research was conducted by Katie with support from Audrey.

In building the website our deepest appreciation is extended to Dr Stephen Symons for designing the site and for going way beyond the initial brief. The website was co-curated and text written by Katie and Audrey. A massive and special thanks goes out to Prof Cynthia Kros for her insightful comments, her swift “red pen” in cutting back and enriching the text describing the life and times of Achmat and his books and awards.

Several photographers donated their photographs for use on the site and these greatly contribute to the telling of Achmat’s life story. We are especially grateful to Paul Weinberg for his huge generosity in sharing his photographs. Many thanks are also extended to photographers Omar Badsha; Paul Botes; Gille de Vlieg; Victor Dlamini; and Gideon Mendel for contributing their photographs. Thanks too to Claudia Schadeberg for permission and contributing Jürgen Schadeberg’s photograph of Fordsburg. Thanks are due to Sophia Duker the Nelson Mandela Foundation for taking photographs of items in the Achmat Dangor Papers. Many thanks also to the Dangor family; Justine Dangor; Isobel Dixon; Audrey; Horst Kleinschmidt; Laila Manack; Oliver Schmitz, Mandla Sibeko and Ben Williams for sharing photographs from their private collections.

Thanks are also due to specific staff and archival institutions for retrieving and supplying images including: Audrey Belcher at Gallo Images; Loly Betancor at Casa África; Julia Brown at Mandela Rhodes Foundation; Linda Chernis at Gay and Lesbian Queer Archives; Kate Dearlove of Africa Media Online; Theo Kemp at the Jakes Gerwel Foundation; Arianna Lissoni at South African History Archives; Gaby Mohale and Elizabeth Marima at Historical Papers Research Archives; Susan Mvungi and Clive Kirkwood of Special Collections and Manuscripts at the University of Cape Town; Zandile Myeka and Sophia Duiker at the Nelson Mandela Foundation; Andrea Nattrass and Muniera Samuels at Pan Macmillan; Zeenat Sujee at Section 27; Babalwa Solwandle at the UWC-Robben Island Museum-Mayibuye Archives; Suzanne Trimel at PEN America; Imtiaz Timol at the Ahmed Timol Foundation and Greg Zeichner at United Nations Photo Archives. Thanks to Brandan Reynolds for permission to feature his cartoon on the website. Every effort has been made to locate the custodians and owners of photographs and archival items displayed on the website.

We would like to thank our families who have supported us throughout the project since its inception in October 2022. Our final massive thanks go to the Ford Foundation for providing the initial funding to set up the project and to our partners the Nelson Mandela Foundation and Historical Papers Research Archives at the University of the Witwatersrand. Without their support the ADLP would not have been possible.

ADLP, October 2024