I am greatly honoured to have been invited to present the 2017 Alan Paton Memorial Lecture at my Alma Mater and in a venue that brings back so many memories of my student days.

The newly published Volume 2 of Bill Guest’s history of the University of Natal contains two episodes from the early 1970s which occurred in this hall. They both have a slight bearing on the topic of this lecture. There was a Rag Variety concert held on this stage where Michael Lambert composed the lyrics parodying Gilbert and Sullivan’s operettas, particularly The Mikado. He lampooned three major campus personalities of the day: Professors Colin Webb, Colin Gardner and Deneys Schreiner: “a giggling tall historian, an English Pwof who lisps and a bearded scientist”; an indication that there was a liberal tolerance of criticism of the university by students.

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