was the product of Winifred Holtby’s passionate dedication to the study and reform of race relations that began with a six-month tour of South Africa in 1926. From this point onwards, she became a tireless supporter of the country’s black trade union movement and campaigned for race equality at home and overseas. She also became increasingly determined to write a novel contrasting African and European ways of life, and this, her fifth novel, fulfilled that aim.
Though the novel is the distillation of Holtby’s varied reform work, its organising principle was the much-publicised coronation of the Abyssinian Emperor Haile Selassie in November 1930 – an event which also inspired Evelyn Waugh’s Black Mischief (1932). Holtby, however, presents a twist on real-life
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Citation: Regan, Lisa. "Mandoa, Mandoa!". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 18 August 2012 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=3752, accessed 21 November 2024.]
