Triomf

Marlene van Niekerk's multi-award winning novel "Triomf" tells the story of the four residents of 127 Martha Street in the then 'poor white' suburb of Triomf, built on the ruins of old Sophiatown, once the vibrant and notorious centre of black city life in Johannesburg. This story of a highly dysfunctional Afrikaans family of the time illustrates the fear and trepidation that was felt about the political changes sweeping the land and their earnest and sometimes amusing attempts to make sense of life even under the most abject of circumstances. The novel relentlessly probes Afrikaner history and politics, revealing the bizarre and tragic effect that apartheid had on the white underclass who should have been its main beneficiaries.