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Theophilus Shepstone is recognised as one of the key figures in the history of colonial Africa. He is credited with developing some of the essential and widely copied features of colonial administration, including indirect rule, customary law and segregation.
And yet he is also one of colonialism’s most enigmatic personalities: fighting for and against Africans and colonists, admired by some, hated by others, but hiding his thoughts and his feelings with an intimidating and silent public persona.
In this book Jeff Guy uses biography and history to break this silence and examine the man and his politics as they evolved in the conflicted and violent history of colonial Natal. He questions long-established and widely held views of Shepstone and his policies, showing that unless he is placed firmly in the context of the histories of the Africans with whom he worked, he cannot be understood.
‘Professor Jeff Guy is a towering figure in the field of Zulu historical studies, and his previous works – including The Destruction of the Zulu Kingdom – largely redefined the historiography of the period.’
— Ian Knight, Anglo-Zulu War Research Society
Professor Jeff Guy is Emeritus Professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He is well known and highly respected for his work on events and personalities associated with the history of colonial Natal and the neighbouring Zulu kingdom. This is the sixth book that Jeff Guy has written on his research in this area. Praise for his previous works range from comments such as ‘No historian of South Africa or imperialism should be without this splendid book’, for Destruction of the Zulu Kingdom, to ‘In this era of quick and transient analysis, it is good to read a true scholar’s interpretation of people and places he knows well’, said of The Maphumulo Uprising. It is these sentiments that also inform this story of Theophilus Shepstone and his remarkable but necessarily unsuccessful attempt to frustrate the processes of change in colonial south-east Africa.
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