Biko

Publication Instance Details #1279

Publication Overview

Translation	Is Multilingual	Explicit Irish Context?	Ekphrasis	Has Paratext?	Reference to News, Media or Technology
No	No	No	No	No	No

Details

Human Rights Issues	Death Penalty/Unlawful Detention/Incarceration Racism/anti-Semitism/Sectarianism State Violence Torture
Languages	Irish
Genre	Short Lyric
Medium	Print Collection
Notes	Steve Biko was a South African anti-apartheid activist. Arrested by South African state forces in 1977, Biko was incarcerated, beaten, and brutally tortured by state security forces, and injured to the extent that he died, alone in his cell. Biko's death inspired a wave of anti-apartheid protests and meetings around the world, and his funeral was attended by over 20,000 people. In this poem, the speaker describes how he hears the tale of a man 'falling out of his chair' in a South African prison, which leads to his death. The speaker describes this as a story told by a 'child', perhaps hinting at the unbelievability of the tale.