J. J. R. JOLOBE

Judged from his own writings Jolobe has an inborn urge towards poetry, for which he is better known than for his prose. Not that he has not made a valuable contribution in the field of prose; but modern literary criticism is inclined not to deal broadly with a writer, for writing has become a specialisation and calls for a centralisation of thought in a special field. Hence in Jolobe it is the poet that is seen. Before him stands Mqhayi, who belongs to the old school of izimbongi into which he has tried to breathe a new life by writing on modern themes. There is nothing of the interpretation of nature and philosophy in nMqhayi’s poetry; it tends to be simply hedonistic. In order to communicate inspiration to others, poetry needs to be somewhat autobiographic, so that the poet watches the stream of the world through the mirror of his own life and the depths of his own feeling. . . . There is a deep philosophy in Jolobe’s poetry. Just as the fore-fathers of the Bantu believed in a God who revealed Himself only through the things they saw happening around them, things like thunderstorms and eclipses of the sun and moon, which could only be interpreted by the primitive prophets, so Jolobe sees the Hand of God in everyday happenings. . . . Whenever I read Jolobe’s poetry I am reminded of the Indian mystic Rabindranath Tagore, who once dwelt upon the need for man’s love of God having the ‘intellect for its ally. . . .’

-Benedict Wallet Vilakazi, The Oral and Written Literature in Nguni (dissertation, University of Witwatersrand, 1946), p.345-7.