Dennis Brutus Defense Committee

Dennis Brutus, poet and South African expatriate, was born in Southern Rhodesia in November, 1924. Brutus was an activist, working for an end to racial segregation in sport. He was repeatedly arrested and imprisoned for his efforts, though he and his family eventually earned an exit visa from and moved to London in 1966. Brutus joined Northwestern University's faculty in 1971, and was granted political asylum in 1983. In 1986, Brutus joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburg. In addition to his teaching and political activism, Brutus published extensively and was known as the “poet laureate of South Africa”.

Parents Francis and Margaret were both South Africans teaching in Rhodesia when Brutus was born. Brutus spent the majority of his early years in Port Elizabeth, in South Africa's Eastern Cape Province, and as a young man he attended St. Augustine's Teacher Training College. In 1944, Brutus entered Fort Hare University, a black student university from which many prominent black South Africans graduated.

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