Many people start singing in church. Thabile Mange started writing in the house of the Lord!
This was in the 1990s at the Roman Catholic Church in Kagiso, his hometown, west of Joburg.
Mange tells the story of how the late Father Shomang, who introduced a newsletter in the church, did everything alone - writing, editing, compiling and printing.
“After observing that, I felt that I should contribute to the newsletter to help ease the burden on the priest. I approached Father Shomang about that and he agreed. I then started writing to the newsletter, focusing on church and religious issues. My articles appeared in the newsletter every Sunday. That motivated me to keep on writing.”
A year later he was writing letters to the Editor, notably at Drum magazine. “My first letter won R100. I kept on writing. One day, the then Drum associate editor Kaizer Ngwenya called me and asked if I was a journalist. I said “no”. After that, we became friends.”
With ink now in his veins, Mange moved to another church, the Faith Mission, the very one in Kagiso once led by the highly political Reverend Frank Chikane in the apartheid years.
“When I arrived there, I started a newsletter, which was fully supported by the church.”
As the faithful would surely attest, his writing was divined from above. In 2005, Mange says, the Sunday Sun invited him to be a columnist. “I was a columnist for three years.”
There was no stopping him now, as he also contributed to Newstime, “which was edited by the controversial David Bullard, for a year”.
Mange believes that writers are readers. His own relationship with the written word began when his late brother, Mandla, a supermarket chain worker, always brought a copy of The Star home after work.
“To answer your question: yes, that’s how my love for the written word took shape. However, at that time, I did not realise it. I just enjoyed reading The Star and discovering new words from the newspaper. Reading The Star newspaper then was a status symbol. Why? Because it was mostly read by the educated middle class.”
“When I started writing to the newspapers, I didn’t struggle. That’s when I realised that reading The Star had helped me a great deal.”
He confesses to being opinionated, so “newspapers provide an outlet for one to vent”.
Letters to the Editor appeal to him because they are concise and “many people read Letters”.
To be able to contribute to the national discourse through newspaper letters one has to be a news junkie, and passionate about current affairs. Mange concedes that this describes him.
“Yes, of course. To write letters, you have to know what’s going on in the country and world. I’m a news junkie. I watch the news and read voraciously.”
A few years ago he added another feather to his cap: he started writing books.
He has five titles under his belt so far, all self-published.
The truth is it’s not easy to be published by big publishing houses. I know writers whose manuscripts were rejected by these publishers, Mange says.
“Self-publishing is not expensive. I spend less than R5 000 to publish my books. Therefore, self-publishing doesn’t take away money from my family. Remember, I started publishing five years ago. So, I use that money to publish other books. I also use social media and word of mouth to market my books.”
His titles include his debut God’s Servants or money grubbers?, published in 2017, which looks at the cult/culture of pastors who are on the pulpit for money; Women Abuse: A cancer killing our nation , and the other side of the gender question - Men Abuse: A Silent Scourge.
His latest book, published a week ago, is the self-explanatory The Face of Poverty Is Black.
His titles cover topical subjects he is passionate about.
Mange still keeps his day job.
“I write after work and on weekends. Most importantly, I plan my writing projects and try as much as possible to stick to the plan. If push comes to a shove, I take leave to focus on writing. I have written five books in the space of five years, whilst juggling studies and family. This has affected my social life, but it’s worth it,” he says of the balance between the two pursuits of his life.
Mange is married with three children.
And the church said: Amen!
Sunday Independent