Novelist and the author of Coconut Kopano Matlwa, publishes an new book focussing on gender based violence

By Giyani Baloi

Dr Kopano Matlwa, the author of Coconut and one of South Africa’s respected fiction writers, has produced her fourth book, Bosadi. Her debutante book is Coconut, and subsequently Other books: Spilt Milk, Period Pain, and now Bosadi.

Doctor Kopano Matlwa navigates and interrogates issues of gender imbalance, women challenges and women abuse among other things, and blends it in her fiction writing. 

Bosadi talks about a black professional middle-class family living in an estate. It talks about how gender based violence could not escape them besides being professionals. It also touches on issues of black professionals and their challenges on hiring South African domestic helpers, who fail to respect them and the work that they offer them. Something that forces them to hire foreign nationals. However, the foreign nationals’ domestic helpers also have their own challenges of identity documents and work permits.

But, foreign national domestic workers tend to respect their bosses and their work since most of them would be working to support their own children back home.

The very children, most of them, would be fatherless for various reasons. Domestic helpers are mostly prime witnesses of domestic violence in the high walls of the suburbs. 

Gender based violence is a big problem in South Africa, which paints a picture of a broken society. Oftentimes, women are victims, but not always. Other than genderising it, perhaps researching the root cause may be more helpful because men and women are bound together in a natural web of human reproduction. 

Bosadi is a very good book that will make you giggle as you go through the domestic helpers’s gossip news about their bosses and more.