Summary

Walter Hambile Kondile is "a simple man, a Xhosa and an African whose life is of no significance to the world". He is the typical "good native" of his generation, poorly educated, submissive and subservient, brought up to know his inferior place and believe that "it was God's design for the white man to rule over me". But this unquestioning obedience is called into rebellion when his beloved daughter, Sindiswa, a committed young struggle activist, goes missing in exile. Kondile's search leads him to Lesotho and grim discoveries of betrayal that shatter forever his own "complicity of silence" committing him to an irrevocable path of no return. I Speak to the Silent is an exciting first novel by a powerful storyteller, who tells his history as he sees it.