The Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Western Cape (UWC), Prof Tyrone Pretorius, is pleased to announce that the Jan Rabie & Marjorie Wallace Bursary for 2024 has been awarded to Lynthia Julius. The bursary of R500 000 stems from a bequest by the late Ms Marjorie Wallace and is awarded to an individual in support of a creative writing project in Afrikaans. 

“The Jan Rabie and Marjorie Wallace bursary is the biggest bursary in support of creative writers in our country” and portrays Rabie and Wallace’s “vision and generosity of spirit,” says Prof. Pretorius.

He also expressed his appreciation to the fund manager and the University’s Jan Rabie and Marjorie Wallace Management Committee for the responsible way the funds have been invested and managed, allowing for interest-based increases in the bursary awards. “In this way UWC has been able to give effect to Wallace’s wish to provide writers with the space and time to be able focus on their writing without the pressure of having to earn an income.”

A Bursary Committee, comprising knowledgeable individuals from the broad literary community, unanimously recommended Julius’s proposal.

A total of 44 applications were received and the Committee was impressed by the range of diverse voices, genres, and the writing experience of applicants. As in the past, the Bursary Committee was impressed with the quality of the majority of the proposals received, confirming the vitality and talent within the Afrikaans writing community.

Lynthia Julius’s proposed novel about a Nama medicine man is set in the 1900s. In addition to an intriguing story with an unsettling core, the novel will also create a socio-political view of Namaqualand and its people within the South African context at the time. The story will be written in Namaqualand-Afrikaans where Nama words not only formed an integral part of Afrikaans in the Northern Cape at the time, but many of these words still form part of the language.

One of the members of the Bursary Committee said that “it will be of significant benefit to all speakers of the different variants of Afrikaans if Lynthia Julius succeeded in her goal. The awarding of the prize to Lynthia Julius fully meets the objectives of this bursary.”

Hear Lynthia Julius speak about the Afrikaans bursary she received.