South African Festival goers are gearing up for the 44th annual National Arts Festival which starts this week in Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape.
South African playwrights are known to be leaders through their art. This holds true for another young playwright from Port Elizabeth who is on his way to America to participate in the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders initiative.
Xolisa Ngubelanga is joining 700 fellow African youth leaders at the Appalachian State University in North Carolina. He will participate in the civil leadership category of the initiative for six weeks.
While he is in America, his production, “Pieces of an African dream”, will be showcasing at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown.
The production has been described as riveting, bold, and thought provoking.
“Pieces of an African dream” tells the life story of two illegal underground miners in South Africa.
The production is significant as illegal mining is a burning issue.
Illegal mining is rife as the so-called zama-zamas extract further riches from the ground.
The characters, played by Fiks Mahola and Xolani Ngesa, are two Zimbabwean men who are stuck underground looking for gold.
Xolisa Ngubelanga is a budding script writer and director. The Rhodes University part-time Masters student in Writing is now stepping up to he global stage.
The director of the play Ngubelanga says: “I was inspired because the theme of Buluyawo’s book we need new names it’s about the set up in Zimbabwe. It’s basically about unearthing the unknown that you don’t see on tv. We never really get to know what really drives the zama zamas we only get to hear about the catastrophes. So I decided to make it more of a personal journey with my pen in terms of portraying the zama zamas.”
“Pieces of an African dream” will be on show at the National Arts Festival In Grahamstown from the June 28.
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