Sadly, Pieter Williams passed away on 29 December 2015. The following piece was written by Pamela Williams.
Pieter Williams – 29 July, 1929 to 29 December, 2015
The man, his work and his influence.
Pieter was born near Alberton in 1929, the younger of two sons and, according to tradition, was given his maternal grandfather’s full name. His father came of Natal settler stock, his mother was deeply rooted in the Caledon farming community, As a result, he spoke English and Afrikaans with equal facility and was fully at home in both cultures.
He matriculated from Christian Brothers College, Boksburg, and having won a bursary, started, in 1947, attending classes at the University of the Witwatersrand, where he obtained his first degree. Subsequently he studied at the Universities of Stellenbosch, Edinburgh and the Free State and also through UNISA. His doctoral thesis encapsulated his experience of teaching literature to students for whom English was a second language.
Although he and his wife to be were both working in Cape Town at the time, they met when his car broke down in Welkom and she was passing through. As he said,’ And that shows how easily an accident can happen!’ They were married in 1962.
He was appointed to the English department of the University of the Free State in 1973, after having taught in a number of high schools in London and in South Africa, including one in a fairly deprived area where he was able to introduce pupils to a world formerly unknown to them by entering choirs he had trained in the local Eisteddfod, by taking them to concerts and to the theatre and by starting a school magazine..
Throughout his career, he was always writing, publishing literary and educational articles – as well as poetry — in literary and academic journals both in this country and overseas. His collection of poems, ‘Eden and After’, was published in the US in 1983.
An accomplished pianist, he composed the settings for numerous songs, including those for a reading series for young children which he conceived and produced. He also played the organ in a number of churches.
His students – to whom he was affectionately known as ‘Uncle Willie’ – were encouraged by his patience and inspired by his innovative methods. Much of his time was devoted to teaching students who would, themselves, become teachers.
During this period, too, he devised and implemented a programme whereby township children were bussed into the city and exposed to English by participating in dance, drama and story-telling.
Many of the students felt free to discuss with him problems not relating to their studies, but to their personal lives and, long after they had left the college or the university, still came to his home to talk to him.
So it came as no surprise that, when he retired in 1994, he became a volunteer with the Befrienders, an international confidential emotional support service with close links to the Samaritans in the UK. Within a few years, he had become the Director of the Bloemfontein branch and later served as the National Training Officer, helping his wife to monitor existing centres and to establish new ones in several provinces.
In 2001 he was awarded the English Academy gold medal in recognition of ‘distinguished service to English’.
He and his wife retired to Hermanus at the end of 2005, where he joined the Pro Musica Choir and where they soon became involved in U3A and the Southern Writers’ Circle.
When he was confined to a wheelchair in April 2010, he continued to listen to his beloved classical music, to entertain friends at home, to watch cricket on TV and to be taken for walks along the coast, spending many happy hours gazing out across the bay or entering into conversation with passing strangers.
The tributes – only some of the many received since his passing – which we have enclosed in the leaflet, bear testimony to his benign influence on a great variety of people during a long and fruitful life of service.
- Pamela Williams, 15 January 2016