Etienne Leroux

Etienne Leroux (13 June 1922 – 30 December 1989) was an Afrikaans writer and a member of the South African Sestigers literary movement.

Early life and career

Etienne Leroux was born in Oudtshoorn in the Western Cape on 13 June 1922 as Stephanus Petrus Daniël le Roux, son of S.P. Le Roux, a South African Minister of Agriculture. He studied Law at Stellenbosch University (BA, LLB) and worked for a short time at a solicitor's office in Bloemfontein. From 1946 he farmed and lived as a writer on his farm in the Koffiefontein district. Etienne was a scholar at Grey College Bloemfontein where he matriculated.

His 1968 Een vir Azazel (One for Azazel in Afrikaans) was translated into English as One for the Devil, and makes use of the Azazel myth.

He died on 30 December 1989, and was buried at the family church yard of Wamakersdrift, of which his farm formed part.

Graham Greene wrote: "His audience will be the audience that only a good writer can merit, an audience which assembles slowly in ones and twos ... the rumour spreads that here an addition will be found to the literature of our time."

Awards

• Hertzog Prize for prose for Sewe dae by die Silbersteins, 1964
• Hertzog Prize for Prose for Magersfontein, O Magersfontein!, 1976 and CNA Literary Award
• CNA Literary Award for Een vir Azazel

List of works

• Die eerste lewe van Colet, 1955
• Hilaria, 1957
• Die mugu, 1959
• Sewe dae by die Silbersteins, 1962
• Een vir Azazel, 1964
• Die derde oog, 1966
• 1844, 1967
• Isis, Isis, Isis, 1969
• Na'va, 1972
• Magersfontein, o Magersfontein!, 1976
• Onse Hymie, 1982
• Die Silberstein-trilogie, 1984 (appeared at Penguin as: To a dubious salvation)

Etienne Leroux. Die eerste siklus. Die eerste lewe van Colet - Hilaria - Die mugu.

A biography of Etienne Leroux, by the respected biographer of Afrikaans writers, John Christoffel Kannemeyer, was published in July 2008.

Selected publications

• Seven days at the Silbersteins Translated by Charles Eglington. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1964.
• One for the Devil Translated by Charles Eglington. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
• The Third Eye Translated by Amy Starke. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1969.
• 18/44 Translated by Cassandra Perrey. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1972.
• To a dubious salvation: a trilogy of fantastical novels Penguin, 1972.
• Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! Translated by Ninon Roets. Hutchinson, 1983.