Barolong Seboni

Barolong Seboni (born 27 April 1957) is a Motswana poet and academic. Born in Kanye Botswana, he received his BA from the University of Botswana and his master's degree from the University of Wisconsin. Quotes Botswana is that place that is not out of the norm in terms of what Africa is, but a place that has the greatest potential to show the world that Africa is possible. https://seneducate.wordpress.com/2018/06/02/an-interview-with-mr-barolong-seboni-botswanas-national-poet/ We are not a new democracy, and we are not an old democracy. We are medium rare because we are getting there— we are getting to well done. https://seneducate.wordpress.com/2018/06/02/an-interview-with-mr-barolong-seboni-botswanas-national-poet/ Literature is the highest form of civilization. https://africaindialogue.com/2016/09/30/the-history-and-future-of-literature-in-botswana-a-dialogue-with-barolong-seboni/ We measure a nation’s progress through its literature https://africaindialogue.com/2016/09/30/the-history-and-future-of-literature-in-botswana-a-dialogue-with-barolong-seboni/ I love my black people / from all four corners of this round earth. https://www.festivaldepoesiademedellin.org/en/Revista/ultimas_ediciones/68_69/seboni.html? I love my beautiful black people / for being black in the wash of whiteness. https://www.festivaldepoesiademedellin.org/en/Revista/ultimas_ediciones/68_69/seboni.html? I wrote this for all African people- All African people struggling with identity, post-colonialism, colonialism, after effects of slavery Exiles, refugees running away from apartheid…some of these were black intellectuals and artists, poets, and writers. They came at a time when we were discovering ourselves as writers We are not a new democracy and we are not an old democracy. We are medium rare because we are getting there- we are getting to well done. It’s a struggle…we makes mistakes. On the whole, I think we are on the right track. The democracy hasn’t crumbled, it limps at times, and then it gets up All poets speak for the silent majority- for the illiterate, for those who cannot write,  for those who cannot speak, and for political, social, or even just any other isms When you write a poem, you think you are writing it, but in actual-in reality, it is writing you. It is writing your circumstance and beyond. Because when you write poetry, you dig deep, you delve deeply into your psyche, your spirituality, into your history, into your tradition, an you are also drawing from everything else you have ever read…everything else you ever heard. In the end, it is not necessarily your voice. It is the voice of everything that came before you, and the spirits that are in and outside of you. When you write a poem, you are not writing to say I want to “disturb the peace.” You are saying, ‘This is wrong. Do not be afraid of criticism, and for goodness sake, you are not a writer if you are just sitting in your bedroom and just writing page after page after page. You are only a writer when other people say you are a writer. An Interview with Mr. Barolong Seboni, Botswana’s National Poet n.d External links Category:1957 births Category:Living people Category:African poets