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Unimportance
In 12 hours, your life could change forever, as Zizi discovers. On the night preceding his Student Representative Council presidential manifesto, and not for the first time, Zizi physically abuses his cheating girlfriend, Pamodi. But Pamodi flees.
During a night that turns out to be the longest in Zizi’s memory, instead of writing the manifesto speech, the reader follows the anxiety-stricken politician in his race against time and cover of the night, as he searches the campus for his missing girlfriend. While Zizi is haunted by the fear that Pamodi might expose him for what he really is, forever damaging his pristine image as the favourite presidential candidate, Pamodi evades detection, and is nowhere to be found.
In the morning, the speech he delivers is not anything anyone could have expected from an SRC star: it is a litany of confessions for his questionable integrity and violence. As Zizi’s words fade, and a sense of shock lingers in the air, he is faced with the reality of his actions; as they realise that they may vote a highly flawed man into office, how will these students vote? What will it mean, either way?
During a night that turns out to be the longest in Zizi’s memory, instead of writing the manifesto speech, the reader follows the anxiety-stricken politician in his race against time and cover of the night, as he searches the campus for his missing girlfriend. While Zizi is haunted by the fear that Pamodi might expose him for what he really is, forever damaging his pristine image as the favourite presidential candidate, Pamodi evades detection, and is nowhere to be found.
In the morning, the speech he delivers is not anything anyone could have expected from an SRC star: it is a litany of confessions for his questionable integrity and violence. As Zizi’s words fade, and a sense of shock lingers in the air, he is faced with the reality of his actions; as they realise that they may vote a highly flawed man into office, how will these students vote? What will it mean, either way?
- GenresFiction
144 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
July 22, 2014
Set on the premises of UWC in Bellville, Unimportance documents twelve hours in the life of Zizi, a young SRC presidential candidate whose personal charisma and deft hand with university politics have put him in a position to become President. On the night before he’s due to deliver a rousing manifesto and win the votes of his fellow students, he gets into a fight with his girlfriend, Pamodi. Their argument escalates into violence, and suddenly Zizi finds himself in a very different place emotionally: his anticipation of triumph and recognition wiped out, he wanders the campus looking for Pamodi.
Thando Mgqolozana, an alumnus, knows every inch of UWC campus, and Zizi passes through the residences and gathering places like a spectre, encountering friends, challengers and acquaintances who spark memories of other places and people. Each incident and recollection is told with sensitivity and the bravery for which Mgqolozana has become known.
His 2009 debut novel, A Man Who is Not a Man, was about initiation, telling the story of a young Xhosa boy whose traditional circumcision goes wrong. This book boldly explored themes of masculinity in Xhosa culture. Mgqolozana’s reputation for controversy was secured with Hear Me Alone (2011), a less than canonical retelling of the Christian story of the birth of Christ.
While Unimportance raises one crucial issue after another, the horribly persistent problem of gender-based violence against women on a local and international level is particularly present and relevant. The ongoing Twitter campaign, #YesAllWomen, gathers the comments of thousands of women who experience violence and the fear of violence daily in order to bring attention to the scale of the problem.
“I have failed to be in private what I lead the masses to believe I am in public”, writes Zizi, contemplating his own violence towards Pamodi. “I am a man of no integrity”. He recognises that of all his choices, he chose violence, and rightly understands what the consequences of his action must be: exposure, censure and disgrace.
Mgqolozana is too nuanced a writer to make excuses for his character, but he opens Zizi’s mind to the reader, along with his past and conflicting desires, his strengths and weaknesses, and gives him a surprising platform to speak to the student body.
Although the tone of this short novel is generally serious, Mgqolozana has a bright sense of humour. Zizi’s ex-roommate, the judo sensei Madoda, nearly suffocates Zizi by boiling samp mielies in a pan without a lid, and Zizi jokes that before dawn, campus is so quite ‘you can hear a student’s gender change’.
Politics often takes centre-stage as Zizi and the other SRC members work to assist students like themselves, desperate for education but lacking finances or access to the hallowed halls of academia. Privilege is not so marked here as at UCT or what Zizi dismissively calls ‘the vineyard in the middle of Stellenbosch’, and for this reason Mgqolozana’s latest novel bears a noteworthy sincerity that speaks both to young South Africans, and also to every citizen in the wake of our recent national elections.
Thando Mgqolozana, an alumnus, knows every inch of UWC campus, and Zizi passes through the residences and gathering places like a spectre, encountering friends, challengers and acquaintances who spark memories of other places and people. Each incident and recollection is told with sensitivity and the bravery for which Mgqolozana has become known.
His 2009 debut novel, A Man Who is Not a Man, was about initiation, telling the story of a young Xhosa boy whose traditional circumcision goes wrong. This book boldly explored themes of masculinity in Xhosa culture. Mgqolozana’s reputation for controversy was secured with Hear Me Alone (2011), a less than canonical retelling of the Christian story of the birth of Christ.
While Unimportance raises one crucial issue after another, the horribly persistent problem of gender-based violence against women on a local and international level is particularly present and relevant. The ongoing Twitter campaign, #YesAllWomen, gathers the comments of thousands of women who experience violence and the fear of violence daily in order to bring attention to the scale of the problem.
“I have failed to be in private what I lead the masses to believe I am in public”, writes Zizi, contemplating his own violence towards Pamodi. “I am a man of no integrity”. He recognises that of all his choices, he chose violence, and rightly understands what the consequences of his action must be: exposure, censure and disgrace.
Mgqolozana is too nuanced a writer to make excuses for his character, but he opens Zizi’s mind to the reader, along with his past and conflicting desires, his strengths and weaknesses, and gives him a surprising platform to speak to the student body.
Although the tone of this short novel is generally serious, Mgqolozana has a bright sense of humour. Zizi’s ex-roommate, the judo sensei Madoda, nearly suffocates Zizi by boiling samp mielies in a pan without a lid, and Zizi jokes that before dawn, campus is so quite ‘you can hear a student’s gender change’.
Politics often takes centre-stage as Zizi and the other SRC members work to assist students like themselves, desperate for education but lacking finances or access to the hallowed halls of academia. Privilege is not so marked here as at UCT or what Zizi dismissively calls ‘the vineyard in the middle of Stellenbosch’, and for this reason Mgqolozana’s latest novel bears a noteworthy sincerity that speaks both to young South Africans, and also to every citizen in the wake of our recent national elections.
February 25, 2023
I found Unimportance a really funny and clever read. It feels very personal to hear all the thoughts, good and bad, of Zizi throughout the night the book takes place. I also loved the imagery of the university campus and the various groups and individuals Zizi bumps into throughout the night.
A fun read with 'important' thought provoking messages too.
A fun read with 'important' thought provoking messages too.
Read
July 26, 2014- Nothing is more frightful than when your girlfriend prays about you in her room, and then lets you know about it via a short text message as soon as she finishes. -
- Nobody tells you when you enrol that university is a half-way house for deadly roommates. -
- The scene at The Barn by night is the stuff alumni memoirs are made of: fondling, groping, and the rest you find out at graduation. There's no fondling with that truth. -
- I wrote mine, read it out in a whisper, another poem gone bad; I deleted all of it, and decided to tell a story. -
- What stays in the mind of the masses is not whether or not you failed; it is that you were associated with failure, that it was a debate at all - and that was the reality I was avoiding. -
- I could not have foreseen that the advent of the laptop would present such serious threats to my health. -
- Nobody tells you when you enrol that university is a half-way house for deadly roommates. -
- The scene at The Barn by night is the stuff alumni memoirs are made of: fondling, groping, and the rest you find out at graduation. There's no fondling with that truth. -
- I wrote mine, read it out in a whisper, another poem gone bad; I deleted all of it, and decided to tell a story. -
- What stays in the mind of the masses is not whether or not you failed; it is that you were associated with failure, that it was a debate at all - and that was the reality I was avoiding. -
- I could not have foreseen that the advent of the laptop would present such serious threats to my health. -
November 14, 2014
How to be good yet unimportant?
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews