Born in 1907, Jack Simons was one of the leading left-wing intellectuals – and one of the greatest teachers – in 20thcentury South Africa. As a lecturer in African Studies at the University of Cape Town from 1937 until he was prevented from teaching by the government in 1964, and thereafter through his lectures and writings in exile, he had a profound effect on the thinking of generations of white and black students and on the liberation movement as a whole.