Durban poet Marí Peté writes in Afrikaans and English. Marí was born and schooled in the Mpumalanga province in South Africa.

Marí wrote her Street Poems Collection while driving to and from various campuses of the Durban University of Technology where she has worked as an e-Learning specialist for almost twenty years. During Poetry Africa 2010, the Mail and Guardian described Marí’s performance of the poem Durban Taxi (a conglomeration of taxi names) as “a delicious success”. The poem Warwick Junction was shortlisted for the Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award in 2012.

Various tensions and juxtapositions arise from Marí’s Cambridge Poetry Collection, which could be ascribed to the fact that the poems were originally written in Afrikaans, during the year before South Africa’s first democratic elections. Halfronde / north and south was written upon receiving the news of the death of Chris Hani.

Marí has published two bilingual poetry collections namely Amytis (2007) and Begin (2002). With Bianca Bothma, Marí was editor of Art for Humanity’s book Women Artists and Poets Advocate Children’s Rights.