gs of Shaka and the Shakan era.
In the twentieth century the image of Shaka continued to be vigorously manipulated and reached a climax with a South African television series and the construction of a "Shaka-land" tourist attraction discussed by Hamilton. In addition, works by indigenous writers produced, overall, a complex and ambiguous portrayal of Shaka. Two examples of these African works that build on, revise, transform, and reinterpret Shaka's life are Thomas Mofolo's novel Chaka (completed circa 1909) and Mazisi Kunene's epic poem Emperor Shaka the Great (1979). Despite the fact that both works are by African writers they demonstrate significant differences in their relationship with historical fact and in the ends for which they were written.
But the effects and intentions of Mofolo's and Kunene's versions of Shaka seem to present fewer difficulties of interpretation than the earlier texts discussed by Hamilton. Hamilton, however, holds that Shaka is a "profoundly ambiguous figure" in the writings of Mofolo and other Africans (20). She also asserts that "the ambiguity which characterizes many other accounts of Shaka" has sometimes been "ascribed to the contributions of twentieth-century authors such as Thomas Mofolo, Ernst Ritter, or Mazisi Kunene, derived originally from African oral texts and indigenous political developments" (121). It is difficult to determine from her comments on Mofolo et al. whether she considers his, and each other, portrait of Shaka to be ambiguous or whether it is Mofolo's image of Shaka taken in conjunction with other literary images that creates
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