INHERITANCE, poems, translated by the poet from isiXhosa, with a new introduction and the original text

146pp., paperback,  First English Language Edition, Batis Books, Edinburgh, 2026

ISBN: 9781918073027

This daring, contemporary, inventive – and now celebrated –  debut poetry collection, first published in 2021 in Athambile Masola's home language of isiXhosa as Ilifa, won the 2022 HSS Award for Poetry.

Writing from a storied literary tradition, Masola’s love poems and historical re-imaginings boldly question the meaning of freedom in a society that is openly hostile to women, and where apartheid has been replaced by other ominous oppressions. 

"Fluent in multiple aesthetic traditions, stylistically mobile, conceptually daring ... a breakthrough in South African literary and feminist writing." Pumla Dineo Gqola

"A deliberate act of resisting erasure and a love letter to both the present and future self." vangile gantsho

Athambile Masola, descended from amaGcina and amaBhele, was born in Ezibeleni in 1987 and grew up in eMonti/ East London. A Mandela Rhodes Scholar, Masola is the founder of Asinakuthula Collective, and teaches in the Department of History at the University of Cape Town. Her other writing projects include co-authoring with Xolisa Guzula, the children's books Imbokodo: Women who shape us and Together Apart: The story of living with apartheid.