Bessie Head

Bessie Amelia Emery was born on July 6, 1937, in Fort Napier mental hospital in Pietermaritzburg, the daughter of a wealthy white woman and a Black stable hand, a union criminalized under apartheid. Raised in foster care, she worked as a teacher and journalist for Drum in Johannesburg.

In 1964, seeking escape from apartheid persecution, Head took a one-way exit permit to Botswana, settling as a refugee in Serowe. There, amidst intense poverty and psychological hardship, she produced a body of transcendent fiction: When Rain Clouds Gather (1968), Maru (1971), and A Question of Power (1973). Her social history Serowe: Village of the Rain Wind chronicled Tswana community endurance with lyrical tenderness.