10 Head, 'Preface to "Withcraft"', Ms.Magazine, November 1975, p.75.

I was born on July 6, 1937, in the Pietermaritzburg Mental Hospital, in South Africa. The reason for my peculiar birthplace was that my mother was white, and she had acquired me from a black man. She was judged insane, and she [sic] committed to the mental hospital while pregnant. Her name was Bessie Emery and I consider it the only honour South African officials ever did me - naming me after this unknown, lovely, and unpredictable woman.