[2] Abrahams was born in 1919 in Vrededorp, a suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa; his father was from Ethiopia and his mother was Coloured, with French and African roots.

[3] Abrahams was five years old when his father died, and with his family thereafter struggling financially his mother sent him to live with relatives until the age of 11, when he became a boarding student at the Anglican Church's Grace Dieu School in Pietersburg.

[4] On graduation from there, he went to St Peter's Secondary School in Rosettenville, paying his tuition fees by working at the Bantu Men's Social Centre.

Despite a manuscript reader's recommendation against publication, in 1942 Allen & Unwin brought out his Dark Testament, made up mostly of pieces he had carried with him from South Africa.

According to Nigerian scholar Kolawole Ogungbesan, Mine Boy became "the first African novel written in English to attract international attention.

His main character, Michael Udomo, who returns from London to his African country to preside over its transformation into an independent, industrial nation, appeared to be modelled chiefly on Nkrumah with a hint of Kenyatta.