VALLEY OF A THOUSAND HILLS
H.I.E. Dhlomo

September 2019
44pp
210mm x 140mm
ISBN: 9780639810850

—

“O Coward soul to wail out thus and fret!
Doth Beauty make you gaze into your soul,
To see not what you see... to brood and dream? 
Encased in self, you see not what eyes paint.
Awake! Arise! and see the beauty of
The Valley of the Thousand Hills – and live!”

—

The classic, mini-epic poem of one of the greats of 20th-century South African writing. An elegiac tale told through the lens of Zulu mythology.

Herbert Isaac Ernest (H.I.E.) Dhlomo was born in Edendale, Natal in 1903. Among other things, he was a teacher, newspaper editor, journalist, commentator, essayist and playwright, and was a co-founder of the Durban branch of the ANC Youth League in 1945. Unlike his better-known brother (and oftentimes collaborator) R.R.R. Dhlomo, H.I.E. Dhlomo wrote primarily in English, and as such played a large influence on future generations of urban black writers, including the Drum writers of the 1950s.

H.I.E. Dhlomo died in Durban in 1956.