Black Hamlet /
by Wulf Sachs.
- Boston, MA : Little, Brown and Company, c1947.
- 324 pages : 21 cm.
This resource contains racist assumptions and attitudes about the African diaspora made by a white psychoanalyst during the mid-twentieth century. Please be advised that this resource may also contain outdated terms or otherwise offensive material in regards to race relations.Additionally, the critical reader may find this title to be most informative for what it details about the state of mind of the author rather than an explicit 'truth' about the African diaspora. Enlarged edition of the author's Black Hamlet; the mind of an African Negro revealed by psychoanalysis published in London, 1937.Also pub. 1947 under title: Black anger.
Part one : Memories of the past -- Part two : White and Black medicine -- Part three : Degradation -- Part four : Under suspicion -- Part five : Kraal-land -- Part six : revolt.
"This is the true story of John Chavafambira. It is unique, never-before-written account of a native African medicine man, his life experiences and inner conflicts, drawn against the background of two worlds--white and black--in collision. This amazing study of seemingly irreconcilable elements is laid in South Africa, where the clash of color is most violent. Wulf Saachs became acquainted with John Chavafambira by merest chance and spent many years studying his personality as both his patient and friend. John was a medicine man (misnamed 'witch doctor') who left his village (kraal) to come to Johannesburg. His father's spirit had told him he was too young to practice, but the poverty, pain and degradation of his people in the city were too much for him and he took up again the ritual and the amazing psychological treatment his father had taught him. Then many strange and unusual things occurred in the eerie world where the medicine man rolled the bones to learn the wishes if the forebears; in the shameful, frightening Swartyard where John lived with his wife, the Zulu girl Maggie. Through Sach's observation, John has emerged a human being of dignity, intelligence, and understanding, a challenge to the white world that rules him. It is the story of a man, to be read by all who yearn for better understanding of their fellow man." --from the book jacket