Nobody's Hero and Ikhayalethu, formed a double bill and the first performance, sponsored by the Detainees' Parents' Support Committee of Johannesburg,  was performed at the Laager, in the Market Theatre complex in 1987.

The play was revised in September 2000 and edited in 2008.

The action takes place in the minute after death and represents a moment in which past and present confront each other in the search for truth.

Matthew Mosimane, a political detainee, is unable to keep his hold on reality as a result of his experiences in detention.   He is haunted by the thought that he has betrayed his comrades.  He was detained during the Soweto Uprising of 1976 when he was sixteen and now again in 1987.  In his mind both periods of detention are confused and he becomes split between his younger and his older selves.  His two selves, alternating between accuser and accused, confront each other in the search for the truth about his role in the struggle.  Mosimane, in trying to recall repressed memories, has imaginary encounters in his cell with individuals who had an impact on his life.  Mosimane identifies with the jaguar in the poem The Jaguar by Ted Hughes.

CHARACTERS   CAST 

Matthew Mosimane,  age 27              Fana Mokoena

Matthew Mosimane, age 16)              David Mokgatle

A white policeman                             Ivor Chipkin

SETTING      A prison cell.