Richard rive

Richard Moore Rive (1931 in Cape Town–1989) was a South African writer.


Biography
Rive was born on 1 March 1931 in Caledon Street in the working-class district of Cape Town called "District Six".[1] Although not classified as white in the Apartheid country, Rive was able to have an academic career in his home country, as well as overseas. In 1963 he was able to travel overseas due to a scholarship organised by the editor of Drum magazine, Esk'ia Mphalele.[1] In 1965 he was awarded a Fulbright scholarship and later obtained a research fellowship at the University of Oxford. He wrote a doctoral thesis on Olive Schreiner which was published after his death in 1996.[2]

Rive was a firm believer in anti-racism[3] but decided to stay in his country in order that he could influence its development there.

Rive focused initially published his stories collections or in South African magazines like "Drum" and "Fighting Talk". He won a prize for his short story "The Bench" which is still anthologised. "The Bench" takes the well known story of Rosa Parkes and sets it in South Africa. He wrote novels called: "Emergency" (1964) set against the Sharpeville massacre and what is regarded as his best novel, "Buckingham Palace District Six" which was published in 1986. This novel turned into a musical by a theatre in Cape Town. He also published a disappointing autobiography entitled, " Writing Black" in 1981.[1]

His last novel, Emergency Continued, was published posthumously as Rive was stabbed to death during a robbery at his home in Cape Town in 1989.