LIZ GUNNER

A Royal Woman, an Artist, and the Ambiguities of National Belonging:
The Case of Princess Constance Magogo

A momentous event on the South African performing arts scene takes place in Durban's Playhouse Opera on May 4, with the world premiere of the new Zulu opera, Princess Magogo. (Press Release, Durban, South Africa, April 2002)

`New Zulu opera a fascinating event' — `A brand new opera being broadcast live to other parts of the world is heady stuff here in KZN.' (Margeret van Klemperer, Natal Witness May 6, 2002)

`…the highlight of the event was the timeous awarding of the posthumous lifetime achievement to Princess Magogo kaDinuzulu, the mother of the Home Affairs Minister Dr Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who accepted the award on her behalf.' (Mduduzi Dlamini on the 8th South African Music Awards ceremony. City Press May 5, 2002)

Why should an opera on the life of a royal woman, renowned as a composer and performer, with an access to an extraordinarily rich archive of Zulu culture, be hitting the headlines at this particular juncture in South Africa, eight years on from its first free elections in 1994? The opera, called simply, Princess Magogo, was staged by Opera Africa for three brief nights in Durban in early May 2002, with the diva of South African singers, Sibongile Khumalo, playing the title role. Her father, Mzilikazi Khumalo, composed the music and the librettist was the writer, Themba Msimang. The versatile Themi Venturas directed the opera, and the flamboyant set and costumes were the work of Andrew Verster. The focus on a woman flies in the face of the accumulation of the construction of Zulu identity around male figures, and around a particular kind of machismo and patriarchy, a process, which as Carolyn Hamilton has incisively pointed out in her fine study of Shaka, Terriffic Majesty: The Powers of Shaka Zulu and the Limits of Historical Invention(1998), was one in which both settlers and indigenous intellectuals and image makers participated.