Litnet

Robin Malan (born 1940) has spent his working life in education, theatre and publishing. While a student at the University of Cape Town, he was founder and chair of the students’ Dramatic Society. He was acting and directing professionally while still a student.

He is known for his theatre work at Cape Town High School in the 1960s (particularly his A midsummer night’s dream and Hamlet) and at Waterford Kamhlaba United World College in Swaziland in the 1970s and 1980s (where he directed, among others, an Africanised The Caucasian chalk circle, The fall and redemption of man, Tartuffe, Little Malcolm and his struggle against the eunuchs, Whose life is it, anyway? and The Biko inquest).

He directed three plays at the Space Theatre in 1971–2: A phoenix too frequent, Skyvers/Jollers and a play for children, Workplay. He was the artistic director of CAPAB’s theatre-in-education company in 1970–1 and the artistic director of the Pact Playwork theatre-in-education company from 1972–8.

He wrote Drama-teach: Drama-in-education and theatre for young people. Among his compilations of plays for schools are: The distance remains and other plays; South African plays for TV, radio and stage; Short, sharp & snappy: Southern African plays for high schools 1 and 2; and African folktales onstage! 1 and 2.

Since 2007, as Junkets Publisher, he has published over 50 new southern African plays individually as the Playscript Series and 10 anthologies in the Collected Series.

Awards

• 1959 Class medal in drama, University of Cape Town
• 2000 The Khula Cape Foundation (formerly the Cape 300 Foundation) Molteno Medal in Gold for Lifetime Service to Literature
• 2009 (As Junkets Publisher) The Arts & Culture Trust Excellence Award for Literature
• 2014 The English Academy of Southern Africa Gold Medal for Services to Education, Theatre and Publishing
• 2018 Zabalaza Theatre Festival Award for contribution to the development of young theatre writers
• 2019 The Order of Imbewu for 50+ years of service to the English alive anthology of high school writing, awarded by the South African Council for English Education (SACEE)