Tsotsi

Athol Fugard

Tsotsi by Athol Fugard (Paperback ISBN 9781786896155) book cover

Available as Paperback, eBook

A classic of South African literature, adapted into a major motion picture, introduced by Jonathan Kaplan

Tsotsi is an angry young gang leader in the South African township of Sophiatown. A man without a past, he exists only to kill and steal. But when he captures a woman one night in a moonlit grove of bluegum trees, she shoves a shoebox into his arms: the box contains a baby and his life is inexorably changed. He begins to remember his childhood and rediscover the self he left behind.

Tsotsi’s raw power and rare humanity show how decency and compassion can survive against the odds.


“Extraordinarily moving”
guardian

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“A real find, by one of the most affecting and moving writers of our time”
financial Times

“One of the best novels in contemporary South African fiction”
times Literary Supplement

“In lean yet lyrical prose … Fugard uncannily insinuates himself into the skins of the oppressed majority and articulates its rage and misery and hope”
new York Times Book Review

“Powerful and disturbing”
mail On Sunday


Athol Fugard

Athol Fugard is one of the world’s greatest living dramatists. His career spans over fifty years of playwriting, stage and film acting, and directing. He has worked in South Africa, on and off Broadway and in London. Tsotsi is his only novel.


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