The Ingrid Jonker Prize is a literary prize for the best debut work of Afrikaans or English poetry. It was instituted in honour of Ingrid Jonker after her death in 1965.
The yearly prize, consisting of R10,000 and a medal, is awarded alternately to an Afrikaans or English poet who has published a first volume in the previous two years.
Sheila Cussons was an Afrikaans poet. She was born on the Moravia missionary station near Piketberg, South Africa, and, after matriculating from Afrikaanse Hoër Meisieskool, studied fine arts at the University of Natal in Pietermaritzburg. She was one of the most important poets in Afrikaans, besides an accomplished painter and artist.
Marlene van Niekerk is a South African poet, writer, and academic. She is best known for her novels, the satirical tragicomedy Triomf (1994) and the Hertzog-winning Agaat (2004), which explore themes including the family, the change in power dynamics occasioned by the end of Apartheid, and inequalities of race, gender, and class. Van Niekerk is also an award-winning poet. She writes in her native tongue, Afrikaans, and teaches at Stellenbosch University.
Gert Vlok Nel is a South African poet. He studied English, Afrikaans and history at Stellenbosch University and worked as a guide, a bartender and a watchman. He has published one collection of poems, Om te lewe is onnatuurlik, for which he received the Ingrid Jonker Prize in 1994. His countryman Etienne van Heerden praised Vlok Nel as 'one of our finest talents'.
The Hertzog Prize is an annual award given to Afrikaans writers by the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns, formerly the South African Academy for Language, Literature and Arts. It is the most prestigious prize in Afrikaans literature.
Afrikaans literature is literature written in Afrikaans. Afrikaans is the daughter language of 17th-century Dutch and is spoken by the majority of people in the Western Cape of South Africa and among Afrikaners and Coloured South Africans in other parts of South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Lesotho and Eswatini. Afrikaans was historically one of the two official languages of South Africa, the other being English, but it currently shares the status of an "official language" with ten other languages.
Hennie Aucamp was a South African Afrikaans poet, short story writer, cabaretist and academic. He grew up on a farm in the Stormberg highlands and matriculated at Jamestown, Eastern Cape before continuing his higher education at the University of Stellenbosch. He died in Cape Town at age 80 on 20 March 2014 after suffering a stroke.
Carellina Pieternella (Lina) Spies is an Afrikaans poet and academic.
Rustum Kozain is a South African poet and writer.
Modjaji Books is a South African small-scale independent publisher. Started in 2007 by Colleen Higgs, it is an independent press that publishes the writings of Southern African women. Many Modjaji titles have gone on to be nominated for and to win prestigious literary awards both in South Africa and internationally.
Badilisha Poetry X-Change is a platform dedicated to showcasing poetry from Africa and the African Diaspora. The project came out of recognising the lack of documentation of African poets, on the African continent and in the rest of the world. Its aims are to fill this void as well as create a comprehensive global archive of Pan-African poets that can accessed internationally. First launched in 2008 as a poetry festival, the Spier Poetry Exchange. by nonprofit organisation Africa Centre in Cape Town, the festival centred on various aspects of developing, celebrating, archiving and documenting poetry and voices. In 2009, the Spier Poetry Exchange changed to the Badilisha Poetry X-Change. Although different in name, Badilisha Poetry X-Change continues the "exchange" between poets, creating spaces and platforms for programmed poetry interventions, workshops and presentations. Its existence continues to provide new and established Pan-African voices a space of celebration, documentation, proliferation, and self-reflection.
Finuala Dowling is a South African poet and writer.
The Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns (SAAWK) is a multidisciplinary organization dedicated to promoting science, technology and the arts in Afrikaans, as well as promoting the use and quality of Afrikaans. The Hertzog Prize is awarded annually by the academy for high-quality literary work, while the Havenga prize is awarded annually for original research in the sciences.
The Media24 Books Literary Awards are a group of five South African literary prizes awarded annually by Media24, the print-media arm of the South African media company Naspers. They are open to authors whose books are published within the Media24 Books stable, which includes NB Publishers, Jonathan Ball Publishers, LuxVerbi-BM, NVA, and Van Schaik Publishers. Each award is worth R35 000. The awards comprise:
Marthinus Versfeld was a South African philosopher. From 1937 to 1972 he taught at the University of Cape Town. He was celebrated as researcher, enjoyed the recognition of the South African literary community and was known as an opponent of the Apartheid system. His work ranged from scholarly books to playful essays on issues like ethics, anthropology, the meaning of life.
Nick Mulgrew is a South African-British novelist, poet, and editor. In addition to his writing, he is the founder and director of the poetry press uHlanga.
Tom Dreyer is a South African novelist and poet writing in both English and Afrikaans.
Theunis Theodorus Cloete was a South African Afrikaans poet, Bible translator, essayist and academic. In the 1970s he was involved in the revision of the ''Afrikaanse Kerkgesange'' and later in the 1993 translation of the Bible. Cloete was linked to The University of Potchefstroom's School of Language and Literature. He has won numerous literary awards, including the Ingrid Jonker Prize, W.A. Hofmeyr Prize, Hertzog Prize (twice) and the Andrew Murray Prize. Cloete mostly wrote under the penname T. Jansen van Rensburg and published numerous of his poems in magazines under the penname to test the water before his 1980 debut Angelliera.
Karin Schimke is a South African writer. She has won awards for her poetry and literary translations. She works as a writer and editor.
Johannes Petrus Spies was a Namibian author and popular storyteller. Alongside P.G. du Plessis he was the presenter of the popular television program Spies en Plessie – met permissie, and hosted personalities like Tolla van der Merwe, Koos Meyer, Danny Pretorius, Nico Nel and Pyp de Villiers.