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Buthelezi’s application of the proverb as a title in Impi, and its extension to encompass social development issues, race relations, gender relations, class politics and rural and urban dialectics allows him to comment on evolving trends within the life experiences of contemporary South Africans, while attributing the tensions and conflicts characteristic of these life experiences to the inequality and social injustices that prevent access to basic human needs. There is a sense that Africans in South Africa are simultaneously engulfed by the traps of modern life and reeling from colonial and apartheid legacies. By considering post-apartheid as the third epoch (colonialism and apartheid being the first and second) Buthelezi is able to suggest the direction in which Africa should develop. Buthelezi seems to suggest that true development would stem from past values.⁸

The first example that demonstrates Buthelezi’s manipulation of the plot relates to the customary practice of adopting nephews and nieces begotten out of wedlock which has been a valued practice in African society. It is viewed as a familial responsibility underpinned by the philosophy of ubuntu (African humanism). Through this philosophy Buthelezi has been able to satirise and critique modern lifestyles that have denuded urbanised, elitist Africans of their sense of nationhood. The juxtapositioning of rural and urban dialectics seems to suggest that vestiges of ubuntu can still be found in the rural areas.

The traditional world not only controlled the sexuality of youths through the system of amaqhikiza (regimentation of girls) and ukubuthwa kwezinsizwa (regimentation of young men), but the problem of children begotten out of wedlock was normally solved by assigning a widower to the ‘fallen’ girl. A classic example of this practice in Zulu history is the marrying off of Nandi, Shaka’s mother, to Gendeyana. With the imposition of colonialism and industrialisation, the age-old practice gradually changed to be replaced by the adoption of these children by their uncles. It is believed that in modern times it is ubuntu not to burden a new husband with the children of another man. There seems to be an underlying understanding that uncles assume responsibility for the girl’s failure to control her sexual desires (Buthelezi: 25). That failure should be contained within the family and thus male members of the family are assigned to raise these children and of course they rely on the material benefits accrued by the family. Also implied in this custom is that the wives of these patriarchs, as they are foreigners in the home themselves, are not consulted on matters related to the adoption of the children and are expected to raise these children as their own (Buthelezi: 22–23). They are called umalumekazi⁹ (female gendered uncle).

The wives become the extension of their husbands in all motherly duties. They have married into the family knowing that it is ‘ubuntu nobuzwe bethu’ (African humanism and nationality) that the uncle ‘uyozibutha zonke izingane zikadadewenu. Uyozibutha noma zingaba yishumi noma amashumi amathathu’ (will collect and raise all the children of his sisters. He will collect and raise them all even if they are ten or thirty) (Buthelezi: 65) because it is their right to be raised under their uncle’s law (Buthelezi: 26). Cele, the character representative of the traditional position in Impi, fails to understand John’s refusal to add these children to his family. What comes into sharp focus is the Eurocentric and the Afrocentric conceptions of what constitutes a family, and how these conceptions affect an urbanised, educated African financially. In this text the clash of cultures, which was dominant in the writings of the first generation of isiZulu writers, is propelled beyond pitting Western and African values against each other, in the course of which the superiority of the Western values is emphasised. In this novel traditional African notions that kept the society intact are revisited and used to question accepted and normalised Western notions.

Buthelezi retrieves and re-concretises African values by activating numerous proverbs which are strategically distributed throughout the narrative. The proverbs work in tandem with axioms derived as moral lessons in the narrative. For example, the narrative’s conflict is based on the violation of a fast declining social code, the adoption of children out of wedlock, which is captured in the quotation ‘kwakuyothenga ilala’ (it is dead). However, the subsequent structuring of the events indicates that throwing away good social practices is tantamount to throwing away one’s identity and humanity and this act only contributes to the state of poverty and underdevelopment witnessed in the country. The axiom that captures the loss of identity and nationhood becomes the basis for the exploration of the general state of affairs within the African nation.

That Buthelezi’s narrative depicts the multi-layered intricacies besetting urban African lifestyles is captured in the proverb, ‘insumansumane imali yamakhanda’¹⁰ (an anomaly, the head tax issue) (Buthelezi: 3, 6). This proverb not only captures a sense of loss but emphasises the absurdity of urban lifestyles. Cele, who was once a migrant, is not averse to change but his fundamental criticism of urban life stems from his realisation of the lack of foresight, from urbanising and modernising Africans, regarding the nature of this change and the indifference with which valued customs are treated in the urban areas. The fact that in the cities life is different and people lead their lives differently to those in the rural areas is captured in ‘seligaya ngomunye umhlathi’ (it chews on another side) (Buthelezi: 7). This proverb sets the tone of the narrative, establishing the moral depravity, materialism, hedonism and decadence of city life which illustrate the change from traditional life to an urban Westernised and elitist lifestyle. This proverb channels the reading to a conclusion, ‘lafa elihle kakhulu’ (the beautiful (land) is dead) (Buthelezi: 14), which is a lament for the good past that will never be retrieved.

By comparing the lifestyles of blood relatives in the rural and the urban areas, Buthelezi is able to direct readers to a conclusion regarding the causes of the evils that beset African urban dwellers and their lifestyles. Life in the urban centres is at all times bound by monetary considerations. As a result, city dwellers are seen to have sold their humanity because they are now known as people ‘abangabekelwa nja’ (those for whom one does not keep a dog) and their homes have turned into ‘kukwanja yotha umlilo’ (it is the house of a dog sitting near the hearth). This implies that they are stingy and inhospitable, the treatment received by Cele when he paid an unscheduled visit to John, his nephew.

Given this cluster of proverbs it is expected that John will not accede to Cele’s request to adopt Uzithelile and Hlanganisani. John gives different reasons for declining this request, one of which is the very old adage, ‘intandane enhle ngumakhothwa ngunina’ (the beautiful orphan is the one licked by its mother), implying that the children will be well raised if their mother takes care of them. Because he violates the custom by discriminating among his own children, for his sister’s children are his own, Cele points out that John’s mother ‘akazalanga ubole amathumbu’ (she did not bear offspring, but her intestines were rotten). The proverb and particularly the emphasis on the metaphor connoted by the words ithumbu (singular) and amathumbu (plural) operate in the same way as in the proverb ‘impi yomndeni isesendeni’ because both allude to the feuds in the family. In the narrative John is the metaphoric rotten and selfish offspring of the Ngubane family. John’s Eurocentric conception of a family is interrogated and shown to be based solely on selfishness without compassion. This materialistic selfishness makes him reject his own children. John’s parents died when he and his sister were very young and his uncle, Cele, because of the customary duties expected of him, raised them (John and his sister) as his own children (Buthelezi: 26). When he adopted John and Lenolo, Cele’s material position bordered on poverty whilst John’s current affluent status puts him in a position where he can afford anything.

The second example through which Buthelezi directs the plot to preferred readings involves class politics and how the peasant and working class is predestined to observe culture while the values harboured by the educated are a barrier to cultural observances. Some of these values relate to the position of women in educated families from which they abuse the powers accorded to them by their educated husbands, as is the case with Popi, John’s wife. Popi’s role in this family is depicted as having a negative impact because she neglects the African values that should be inculcated in their children.

Changing gender roles that are based on Western formulations shift power bases and adversely affect the family structure in urbanised, educated families. The choices and decisions made regarding traditional culture are based on material acquisition. Popi’s values are those that look up to European mores at the expense of African ones, creating ‘umlungumnyama’ (a black white man) out of her children. The location of these children in a black urban township worsens matters because they become islands. Their cultural disconnection is witnessed in the white friends they have, their use of English as a first language, the white schools they attend, the white manners they display and their consciousness about status. This explains Cele’s retort, ‘izingane zikaBafana ngeke zilibone eliwinayo, uyongibuza ungiphale ulimi’ (Bafana (John) children will not be able to see the winning one, you will ask and scrub my tongue) (Buthelezi: 48). Buthelezi’s picture of class distinctions in urban areas establishes Cele’s class as ‘izinqe zoluntu’ (the bottom of humanity) but as far wealthier in human values than educated people, ‘izingengelezi zezimpandla’ (the bald heads) because their financial success and education ‘igugule ubuntu basala bezingebhezi, benqunu’ (has eroded their humanism and left them bald and nude) (Buthelezi: 10).

Equally disparaged is the kind of education provided by the white schools which black learners attend. For Buthelezi, these schools are far from being multiracial. They remain white, in spite of their multiracial composition. Buthelezi is of the opinion that true education is only offered in the rural areas where it is related to their material conditions. Evidence is provided by Uzithelile and Hlanganisani’s performances in class and in sports and their subsequent success in Ongoye and American universities. The tendency of black parents to enrol their children in white schools and universities only heightens their deculturation and the crises in their identity as has been the case with Melody (Buthelezi: 223, 224, 228). Euthanasia eventually defies his mother and goes on to study at Ongoye, like his rural cousins, where he is successful in his studies. According to Buthelezi, studying in what were known as ‘bush universities’ seemingly prepares one sufficiently to be able to cope with any educational situation. Thus Euthenasia is also successful in American universities. The kind of veiled racism operative in white schools and universities limits the freedom of black children and hence their excellence is always restricted to sporting activities (Buthelezi: 137) However, American institutions still hold a glimmer of hope for such children as seen in the achievements of Euthenasia and his cousins.

Buthelezi’s concept of education is that it is based on life-long learning during the course of which individuals take an active role in pursuing programmes for social development. He conveys this by juxtaposing John and Popi’s social involvement after completing their studies and John’s nephews’ involvement in agricultural, economic and social politics. John’s education only procures him a certificate. He studies for the first degree that enables him to get a good job and spends the rest of his life siphoning material benefits for himself and his immediate family. His kind of education creates class divisions between the educated and the uneducated and contributes to structural underdevelopment and intellectual poverty (Buthelezi: 140). John fails to use his education to find solutions to problems besetting the society. The elite class, those of John’s calibre, are intellectually emaciated and given to escapism as a way of dealing with the anguish faced by their society. They drink heavily, live in perpetual lethargy, indulge in hedonistic lifestyles, listen to ghetto music and seek affection and fulfilment in sexual overdrive, diluting values and contributing to the general depravity, decadence and social entropy that typify urban lifestyles (Buthelezi: 140).

Popi’s education is equally castigated. She engages in life-long learning of the wrong kind since her learning only increases the number of degrees she obtains. Her education fails to broaden her mind and she cannot translate it into tangible aspects that can contribute to social development or, at least, identity-definition. Her learning contributes to her financial viability and status that she uses for career advancement in her insatiable desire for top positions at the hospital, but it also causes the disintegration of her marriage (Buthelezi: 65, 187–189, 191). For Buthelezi, Popi’s education does not lead to development because, despite her appointments to high positions, she does not have the skill and knowledge that can lead to true social development when correctly applied.

Uzithelile and Hlanganisani’s life-long learning, by contrast, contributes to social development. Their return from America is marked by their involvement in social politics that seeks to effect change through agriculture and education. This change is not only for rural women in the informal trading structures (Buthelezi: 231, 236), but also in politics where women participate in political structures that seek to uproot all causes of poverty and underdevelopment in African societies (Buthelezi: 153–158). Through these siblings Buthelezi demonstrates the kind of educated people that Africa needs for true development in all spheres of modern living.

The dramatisation of racial politics and interracial relations in the narrative also reflects the infighting that is characteristic of family life. The politics of race is reflected in educational, religious, political and economic matters which are all causes of interracial tensions and racial exclusions that lead to underdevelopment and poverty in the country. Buthelezi postulates three categories of white people to assess their contribution to the state of black people in the country. The first category comprises dubious, colonial Christians (Buthelezi: 226) and their role in causing social strife, particularly the clash of civilisations that is characteristic of modern African life and the accompanying poverty and psychological violence to which African societies have been subjected.

Affluent liberal capitalists constitute the second category represented by John’s employer. These capitalists contribute to the state of apathy witnessed among black South Africans. People in this category are characterised by self-deluding tendencies based on fallacious outlooks. In their eyes offering poverty-inducing wages to the majority of Africans, and extraordinary salaries to a few blacks, brings about social development. However, as far as Buthelezi is concerned, this outlook is based on ‘ubugovu bedlazana’ (aggrandisement of the few) (Buthelezi: 258, 259) which is poverty-causing. For Buthelezi, this category of white people denudes the majority of their sense of self and pride as seen in the character of Velemseni, renamed Williamson for the convenience of his white employers. But this category of whites also creates a class of affluent Africans who are delusional about their identities and human value as evinced by the character of John.

The third category, represented by Martin, consists of good white people who are true Christians, and who are socially conscious and have a sense of duty towards the underprivileged sectors of the community. They are characterised by respect for other cultures. Their involvement with the disadvantaged in the society does not stem from the desire to benefit but the desire to advance humanity in general (Buthelezi: 74, 78, 81, 84).

Both in Aphelile Agambaqa and Impi YaboMdabu Isethunjini the application of the proverbs as title of the narrative presupposes that the narrative will be read in such a way that its truth is demonstrated. At times, however, evolving trends in contemporary life produce a certain flexibility in the linguistic formulation of the proverb that manages to capture and interpret these from the traditional perspective. Moving from the family infighting produced by the violation of a cultural code as captured in the proverb ‘impi yomndeni isesendeni’ (the war of the family is in the testicle) to ‘impi yaboMdabu isethunjini’ (the war of Africans is in the intestines), allows Buthelezi to transcend the original application and interpretation of the proverb bringing into the narrative issues that never would have been captured by the old adage in its original meaning. He has thus been able to raise socio-political and economic issues as reflected in the cultural interaction of different racial groups in South Africa.