(André P Brink
accepting his award at the 2014 ACT Awards)
It is with great sadness that the Arts & Culture Trust
(ACT) has learnt the news of André P Brink’s passing at the age of 79.
“Our hearts are filled with sorrow and we extend our sincere
condolences to Mr Brink’s family and friends. He is a true South African icon
and literary giant. He leaves behind a proud legacy of remarkable achievements.
He won numerous awards and we are immensely honoured that among those is an ACT
Lifetime Achievement Award for Literature, which the ACT Board had the
privilege of bestowing on him in 2014,” says Pieter Jacobs, CEO of ACT.
Brink passed away while returning from Amsterdam after
receiving an honorary doctorate from the Belgian Francophone Université
catholique de Louvain (UCL). At the time of his passing, he was a Professor
Emeritus of the University of Cape Town.
Born in Vrede in the Free State in 1935, Brink is the author
of numerous plays, works of non-fiction, and novels including Instant in the Wind, Rumours of Rain, Imaginings
of Sand, The rights of Desire, The Other side of Silence and recently, Philida, which was longlisted for the
Man Booker Prize in 2012. His novel Dry
White Season was adapted for the screen in 1989 and starred Marlon Brando,
Susan Sarandon and Donald Sutherland. His novel Kennis van die Aand saw Brink being the first Afrikaans writer’s
work to be banned by the Apartheid censors in 1973.
His impressive archive of phenomenal works (that have been
translated into 36 languages) earned him, amongst others, the CNA Award (three
times), the Hertzog Prize (twice), and he was also shortlisted for the Booker
Prize (twice). Brink is the recipient of the Prix Médicis Ètranger, Premio
Mondello, Monismanien Human Rights Award, the Martin Luther King Memorial
Prize, and the Commonwealth Literature Prize for the Africa region.
For more information visit http://af.wikipedia.org/wiki/André_P._Brink
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