The Black Coolie
LALLA, B.D.
n.p. [Durban, South Africa] n.p.. 1946.
Description:
Presentation copy. First, and almost certainly only, edition. 178x122mm. 12 leaves, printed on recto only. Original blue wrappers, soiled and stained. Internally very good but with some toning to edges. Inscribed on the inside front cover "Miss M. Worries With Compliments From B.D. Lalla". Seemingly unrecorded in Worldcat and Library Hub and no copies appear in the auction records.
This small booklet is a collection of twelve poems (one on each leaf) linked by themes of race, indentured labour, politics and the land. These are angry poems, the collection beginning with the lines:
"Emotions recollected in tranquillity -
Not these".
Coolies (the word is a pejorative one) were little better than slaves. They were exported from India to other British colonies to work on farms and plantations. B.D.Lalla is writing from the experience of an Indian brought to the South African sugar belt. It is a literature of what might now be called "allyship", a plea for solidarity between the oppressed native black population of South Africa and the Indian migrant community. Lalla saves his most strongest but at the same time most optimistic words for his final poem:
Whiteman! Whiteman!
Shall I hate thee?
...
Blind force, brute force,
Might force, race force,
All are hate force.
Soul force, kind force,
Free force, true force,
These are love force.
Description:
Presentation copy. First, and almost certainly only, edition. 178x122mm. 12 leaves, printed on recto only. Original blue wrappers, soiled and stained. Internally very good but with some toning to edges. Inscribed on the inside front cover "Miss M. Worries With Compliments From B.D. Lalla". Seemingly unrecorded in Worldcat and Library Hub and no copies appear in the auction records.
This small booklet is a collection of twelve poems (one on each leaf) linked by themes of race, indentured labour, politics and the land. These are angry poems, the collection beginning with the lines:
"Emotions recollected in tranquillity -
Not these".
Coolies (the word is a pejorative one) were little better than slaves. They were exported from India to other British colonies to work on farms and plantations. B.D.Lalla is writing from the experience of an Indian brought to the South African sugar belt. It is a literature of what might now be called "allyship", a plea for solidarity between the oppressed native black population of South Africa and the Indian migrant community. Lalla saves his most strongest but at the same time most optimistic words for his final poem:
Whiteman! Whiteman!
Shall I hate thee?
...
Blind force, brute force,
Might force, race force,
All are hate force.
Soul force, kind force,
Free force, true force,
These are love force.