Choosing to be Free

‘Human beings can choose. They can stand back and look atalternatives. Theoretically, they can choose about anything. Theycan choose whether to live or to die; they can choose celibacy orpromiscuity, voluntary poverty or the pursuit of wealth, ice-creamor jelly.'– Rick TurnerBorn in Cape Town on 25 September 1941, Rick Turner was one of SouthAfrica's most original and powerful thinkers and is remembered today asan activist and a remarkable lecturer pioneering the teaching of radicalpolitical philosophy. For almost ten years, from 1968, when he returned toSouth Africa from his studies at the Sorbonne, to 1978, when he was shotby an unknown assassin, Turner played an important role in the oppositionto apartheid, especially by provoking whites to expand their vision of whatSouth Africa could be.Turner's friendship with Steve Biko and others in the Durban-based blackconsciousness movement enabled him also to act as an effective interpreterof black thinking to politically conscious whites. Believing in the ‘necessityof utopian thinking', he wrote a short book, The Eye of the Needle (1972) thatsought to envision a very different kind of society. It has become a classic ofits kind. For the authorities Rick Turner was a constant source of annoyance,a threat and anomaly that had to be dealt with. What was most dangerousabout him was that his life and thought failed to fit within the dominantnarrative of his time. Never a member of the ANC or the CommunistParty or any political party for that matter, he propounded a vision for thetransformation of South Africa that was both independent and radical.Shot through a window in his Durban home on 8 January 1978 at the ageof 36, Rick Turner lived a short life. The window in which he was able tomake an impact on his society was very narrow. Nonetheless, for thosewho came into contact with them, his ideas had a profound effect on theirimaginations about what was possible. Following four months after Biko'sdeath in detention, Turner's murder created a public outcry. Since his death,his legacy has yet to take proper shape. In the severely compromised politicalclimate following the end of apartheid, there is little room for the idealistvision that Rick Turner lived and died for.

‘Human beings can choose. They can stand back and look atalternatives. Theoretically, they can choose about anything. Theycan choose whether to live or to die; they can choose celibacy orpromiscuity, voluntary poverty or the pursuit of wealth, ice-creamor jelly.'– Rick TurnerBorn in Cape Town on 25 September 1941, Rick Turner was one of SouthAfrica's most original and powerful thinkers and is remembered today asan activist and a remarkable lecturer pioneering the teaching of radicalpolitical philosophy. For almost ten years, from 1968, when he returned toSouth Africa from his studies at the Sorbonne, to 1978, when he was shotby an unknown assassin, Turner played an important role in the oppositionto apartheid, especially by provoking whites to expand their vision of whatSouth Africa could be.Turner's friendship with Steve Biko and others in the Durban-based blackconsciousness movement enabled him also to act as an effective interpreterof black thinking to politically conscious whites. Believing in the ‘necessityof utopian thinking', he wrote a short book, The Eye of the Needle (1972) thatsought to envision a very different kind of society. It has become a classic ofits kind. For the authorities Rick Turner was a constant source of annoyance,a threat and anomaly that had to be dealt with. What was most dangerousabout him was that his life and thought failed to fit within the dominantnarrative of his time. Never a member of the ANC or the CommunistParty or any political party for that matter, he propounded a vision for thetransformation of South Africa that was both independent and radical.Shot through a window in his Durban home on 8 January 1978 at the ageof 36, Rick Turner lived a short life. The window in which he was able tomake an impact on his society was very narrow. Nonetheless, for thosewho came into contact with them, his ideas had a profound effect on theirimaginations about what was possible. Following four months after Biko'sdeath in detention, Turner's murder created a public outcry. Since his death,his legacy has yet to take proper shape. In the severely compromised politicalclimate following the end of apartheid, there is little room for the idealistvision that Rick Turner lived and died for.