Bosadi

The subject matter in Kopano Matlwa’s work is never easy to contend with, but she writes with an accessibility that invites you to imbibe it whole, no matter how tough, and barely taking pause to breathe as you do. In Bosadi, Naledi and Aunty are the authoritative and astute narrators who, through careful observation of the other, unpack a story about deep inequality, marriage, domestic violence and grief. The vastly different circumstances of the two women, one a domestic worker from Zimbabwe and the other an upper middle-class black South African, act as the ever-present elephant in the room keeping each of them ‘in check’, despite attempts at closing the chasm through kindness and care. The narration also works well to trap you, the reader, in the same four walls that held the characters prisoner during a countrywide lockdown, gasping at each new hurt Naledi suffers at the hands of her adulterous and abusive husband.