Three protagonists in B.W. Vilakazi’s “Ezinkomponi” (“On the mine compounds”)

• Published in: Literator Vol. 32; no. 2; pp. 173 - 188
• Main Author: N. Zondi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: AOSIS 01-08-2011
• Subjects: Alienation; Goldmine; Suffering; Workers Pain
• ISSN: 0258-2279; 2219-8237
• DOI: 10.4102/lit.v32i2.17

In this poem the great Zulu poet B.W. Vilakazi is preoccupied with the surreal scene of a gold mine compound in the 1940s Johannesburg, and reflects on the three protagonists of the drama that plays out in front of him: the miners, mine magnates and the heavy machinery, all things that drive the entire enterprise of enslaving the workers. Feelings flood his imagination: about the terrible status of the miners (with whom he identifies); what they have left behind, their dreams and the reality they battle with; the unfeeling and overwhelming spectre of industrialisation, and distant capitalist interests; and the instruments of oppression: the deafening mine machines. These three protagonists(especially the first and the third,) assume human characteristics and fight to justify their respective roles in the conflict. Vilakazi’s famous protest poem becomes a cry for help in the face of destructive industrial advancement as everpresent human drama, which pits values of gold/ and money against what is more fully human and worth living for; possibly unachievable present prosperity against a vision of future happiness and fulfilment.