Thursday night saw the launch of Idasa’s 2010 Democracy Index, Testing Democracy alongside the opening of Lobby Books, a joint indie bookshop venture that is less about competition, as we previously reported, than it is about collaboration. Lobby Books is a partnership between Mervyn Sloman, of The Book Lounge, and Henrietta Dax, of Clarke’s Books.
After the event was opened by Idasa executive director Paul Graham, UCT associate professor of law Richard Calland spoke about the importance of a bookstore at Idasa, and the creative use of the space overseen by Architect Justin Cooke.
Continuing along the theme of development, guest speaker Njabulo Ndebele outlined the context in which the Democracy Index series, established in a distinctly different political era, now finds itself. He spoke particularly of the need for a reshuffling of our nation’s priorities; a shift to putting the people of South Africa ahead of political parties.
Judith February and Neeta Misra-Dextra, the book’s editors, highlighted the findings that Ndebele described as an “attempt at a qualitative assessment of democracy and equality” with a focus on the inter-relatedness of democracy and development. Testing Democracy is the third iteration of the Idasa’s Democracy Index. May the works continue to help actuate our democratic society, still-latent for many.
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Idasa’s Democracy Index 2010: Testing Democracy: Which way is South Africa going? edited by Judith February and Neeta Misra-Dexter EAN: 9781920409159 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
Alert! Thursday 11 March will go down in history as the date upon which Cape Town’s first indie bookshop war began.
Tensions have been simmering, it must be said, for some time, with young-lion indie heavyweights The Book Lounge and Kalk Bay Books fighting for the spoils of the launch business, while the (comparatively) grizzled Clarke’s Books and The Bay Bookshop held themselves above the fray.
Now, however, one of the old warriors has decided to regird and chase the glory of yore, and has sent a mighty salvo across the bows of its rivals. The Bay Bookshop will open its new, fringe-of-the-CBD Waterkant premises with the launch of Evita Bezuidenhout’s Evita’s Kossie Sikelela on the fated Thursday, 11 March. This is an event that would normally count as The Book Lounge and/or Kalk Bay Books’ meat and drink.
Not to be outflanked, Kalk Bay Books has responded to the threat with the clever and wholly unlooked-for strategy of offering its customers… meat and drink. That’s right, Ann Donald will preside over the opening of her new bookshop’s annex, a restaurant called, erm, The Annex, later this month – possibly, even, on the night following The Bay’s launch, when the bookshop will host Breyten Breytenbach and Gus Ferguson.
But the loudest roar of defiance at The Bay Bookshop’s brazen challenge has come, not unsurprisingly, from The Book Lounge, which is countering the threat of a new indie store on its turf by… opening a new indie store of its own.
That’s right! The Book Lounge has teamed up with Idasa to start Lobby Books, a shop that will operate from Idasa’s Cape Town premises at 6 Spin Street in the CBD. It will be opened in grand style on – you guessed it – the 11th of March, with the launch of Idasa’s Democracy Index 2010. As counterweights against Tannie Evita’s flair – which The Bay Bookshop will be flaunting on the city’s west side – Lobby Books has lined up both Njabulo Ndebele and Richard Calland as the stars of its show.
What will these developments portend for Cape book lovers? Plenty of good reading, one suspects. BOOK SA will cover the new indie bookshop wars as diligently as possible! Meanwhile, here are the details of the second indie bookshop launch on the 11th of March:
Event Details
Date: Thursday, 11 March 2010
Time: 5:30 PM for 6:00 PM
Venue: Lobby Books, Idasa 6 Spin Street Cape Town | Map
Here’s a story on the Idasa book that ran in this week’s Sunday Times:
The dominance of South Africa’s ruling party was eroding the security of the country’s 16-year-old democracy, the Institute for Democracy warned in a book due out next week.
According to Testing Democracy, the country scored only 5.8 overall on a scale of 10. Idasa’s democracy index rates anything below five as unacceptable and anything above eight as being “as close to the democratic ideal as possible”.
In individual categories, South Africa scored 6.9 for electoral independence – but only 4.8 for accountability.
“Weak institutions – a significant characteristic of South Africa’s democracy – struggle to promote the effective functioning of the state and fail to provide the checks and balances necessary… ” said co-editors Neeta Misra-Dexter and Judith February.
Idasa’s Democracy Index 2010: Testing Democracy: Which way is South Africa going? by Judith February, edited by Neeta Misra-Dexter EAN: 9781920409159 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
The Fifth Annual Pride Book Fair was surely a highlight on Cape Town Pride 2010’s event calendar. Emcee Odidiva sparkled as he introduced the authors and editors of the growing body of South African GLBTI literature.
He reflected that the Book Fair is one of those slightly more serious events. “It’s a little more toned down and we get to deal with our issues and talk about them. And how many issues there are indeed. I’ve never heard of homophobia being so prominent in the news as in the last three months. Everywhere you turn, there’s drama out there. Malawi – damn! Kenya – pshewwwww! It just hasn’t stopped.”
He said, “We’re lucky in this beautiful country to be protected, to be allowed to be who we are. But now, as the son of a preacher and it being a Sunday, I’m so glad we’re getting to discuss topics like self image and shame with the heavyweights of literature here tonight”.
Miriam Dancing is a moving collection of narratives by lesbian, bisexual and transgender women who tell their personal stories of love and hope. Elise van Wyk started by lighting a candle to commemorate the 31 South African lesbians who, despite legal protection, had been killed in hate crimes. “I do this every time I do a presentation,” she said, “and every time, there are more women to be remembered.” Referring to a chapter in the book, “We Weep for our Sisters”, she said, “We honour them; they are not here to tell their stories.”
A slide show presented exquisite images of women who love women, alone and together, at work and breaking bread, at play and in embrace. The candid photography was tender, sensual and intimate, inspiring a sense of the vibrant and sacred lives of its subjects.
Odidi paid tribute to Kalk Bay Books and all the other independents that historically provided an outlet for the kind of literature he wanted to read.
Zinaid Meeran, author of Saracen at the Gates, cycled to Kalk Bay as part of his training for the Argus cycle tour. After tucking his bicycle in between the book shelves, he read from his debut novel. won the 2009 EU Literary Award and raised appreciative chuckles at the detailed description of “glazed erotic trances” and uncles perving over expanses of naked young flesh.
He spoke of the oddness that was his youth, marooned between the deep green ocean of sugar cane on one side of a narrow strip of KwaZulu-Natal coast, and the deep blue sea on the other. His Afrikaans grandfather, Coloured mother and Indian father (who seldom emerged from peanut-popping on the Lazyboy) didn’t make things easier. “I was confused on a number of fronts. I had no idea why people expected me to be a man; I couldn’t figure out why they thought I was Indian. I just didn’t get it. I knew I was all those things – Afrikaner, Coloured and Indian.” He said his book was a battle cry for those without racial, sexual or gender identity. “It’s for those who know they are something made up of fragments of history – those who have first hand experience of roots anarchy.”
Next up was Charl Marais and Joy Wellbeloved, co-editors of TRANS, launched in the Whale Well at Iziko last year. Marais talked about how the 26 contributors to this book experienced doctors and social workers who were ill-informed and didn’t know what treatment or advice to offer; familial bewilderment and colleagues who didn’t know how to deal with them; as well as religious leaders who prescribed guilt and damnation. He concluded: “Although transgenderism is classified as a psychiatric disorder, there’s nothing that a hormone pill and a surgeon’s scalpel can’t fix!”
The final contribution was a short story “Sweet is the Night Air”, the latest publication from independent publisher Robin Malan, who relit the candle to honour the event. Junkets Publisher’s Yes, I Am! was compiled by Malan with Ashraf Johaardien, and includes luminaries like Damon Galgut, André Carl van der Merwe, Gerald Kraak, K Sello Duiker, Zackie Achmat, David Lan, Peter Krummeck, Shaun de Waal and Pieter-Dirk Uys.
As book lovers and gay lovers filed out in the night, the full moon rising over the Helderberg sent silvery rays over the sea. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to imagine that Artemis had lingered between the shelves with a glass of Leopard’s Leap, heartily approving of the festivities.
TRANS: Transgender Life Stories from South Africa edited by Ruth Morgan, Charl Marais, Joy Rosemary Wellbeloved EAN: 9781920196226 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
Wole Soyinka headlined last week’s Jaipur Litfest and the reports are trickling through. Here’s Soyinka on the day he learned of his Nobel:
Jaipur: Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, the first African to have received the honour [...] told the Jaipur Literature Festival that he was shocked to win the coveted prize. Although speculations were rife about him winning the prize but the announcement came as a shock.
The normally composed writer got animated at the mention of the topic and decided to ‘entertain’ the audience with the story of his Nobel Prize. “I was on my way to Nigeria, and was stopping at Paris when the first burst of rumour happened. I alighted in Nigeria amidst the news. One of my cousins, asked me about it. I said, ‘I want to go to sleep’. This wretched cousin, I will call him a traitor, let in a Swedish journalist. The journalist said, ‘My newspaper has asked me to be with you when the announcement takes place.’ And when the announcements were made I couldn’t absorb it,” he said.
And here’s the laureate on racial profiling and terrorism:
First African Nobel laureate Akinwande Oluwole ‘Wole’ Soyinka feels that racial profiling is a “complete failure” when it comes to curbing global terrorism.
“The arrest of the Nigerian national from the flight to Detroit in December for alleged possession of explosives does not call for racial profiling of all terror suspects. The Nigerian national may have fallen into bad company. It should be inquired where he was indoctrinated. He may have been of a spiritual nature and was indoctrinated into the jihadist philosophy,” Soyinka told the media at the Jaipur Literature Festival Friday.
“It is unfair to discriminate against terror suspects on racial grounds. Several Nigerian nationals lost their lives in the London underground terror attacks and in strikes elsewhere across the globe,” said the 75-years-old Nigerian novelist, poet and playwright.
Alert!The Book Lounge has released its list of 2009’s must-have reads – a terrific, considered collection of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and cookbooks that features many works of SA Lit (all shown above).
There Was This Goat: Investigating the Truth Commission Testimony of Notrose Nobomvu Konile by Antjie Krog, Nosisi Mpolweni, Kopano Ratele Book homepage EAN: 9781869141660 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
Controversial Department of Arts and Culture mandarin Sandile Memela has produced a scathing attack on South Africa’s black writers, accusing the likes of Zakes Mda, Moeletsi Mbeki, William Gumede, Jacob Dlamini and others of pandering to white interests and holding back South Africa’s development into a truly just society with views that are “far too reactionary, simple and predictable – especially from blacks with PhDs”.
Stop rubbishing the government and start celebrating freedom! is Memela’s plaintive cry:
The last ten years have been marked by a strange phenomenon in black writing.
This is a visible and negative literary portrayal of the black experience and critical assault on black identity and achievement.
This is quite ironic.
But black writers have, unwittingly, become enemies of everything that their people fought for.
Fiona Ross, of UCT’s Department of Social Anthropology, has penned the title Raw Life, New Hope which takes a close look at the lives of the residents of the The Park, a township on the outskirts of Cape Town.
Raw Life, New Hope: Decency, housing and everyday life in a post-apartheid community, by Associate Professor Fiona Ross of the Department of Social Anthropology, doesn’t skimp on the scholarly rigour.
But it’s also the kind of book that Ross wants the lay reader and occasional book club – tick that box – to pick up between the Austens and travelogues. So in telling the fly-on-the-wall story, chronicled over 13 years, of the residents of local shantytown The Park, Ross has tried to capture the little details of life in the community that illustrate how people create meaning in their lives.
It’s twenty years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the world’s nations have yet to establish a new equilibrium. Two recently-published SA authors team up to pinpoint South Africa’s place in the ongoing political and demographic evolution. “This is the age in which the facts of borders and visa applications matter much to the rich but very little to the poor,” they write. Highly recommended:
So, this conclusion is undeniable: the facts that make for the social world, as the sociologists insist, are stubborn. This explains why, in recent years, much attention has been given to the mechanical idea of “statemaking”.
Most visibly this has happened in Iraq and Afghanistan where respective invasions have struggled to create the conditions necessary for viable states. This is a return to the 19th-century idea that states could be hacked out of often adverse social conditions if the necessary force were brought to bear on the social world.
In other places the idea of states as a means to social organisation — let alone social discipline — has simply disappeared. It is not difficult to understand why Somalia is said to be a “failed state”.
And when New Orleans almost drowned three years ago that little corner of the United States looked decidedly like a “failed state”. What this confirms is that all social formations are “working models” — to use a recent phase from the Indian writer, Arundhati Roy.
In South Africa these have revealed a particular pathology. It was apartheid’s infatuation with modernity and its long support by Western capital that stunted any hope that the nationalism on offer in Afrikaner-ruled South Africa could be anything but partial.
Architects of Poverty: Why Africa’s Capitalism needs Changing by Moeletsi Mbeki EAN: 9781770101616 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
Re-imagining the Social in South Africa: Critique and Post-Apartheid Knowledge edited by Heather Jacklin, Peter Vale Book homepage EAN: 9781869141790 Find this book with BOOK Finder!
Alert! It’s been a while since you’ve read JM Coetzee’s Waiting for the Barbarians, hasn’t it. Go on, own up, we’re all friends here.
Well, get cracking on that, because you’ll to want to walk into the next Great Texts / Big Questions lecture at UCT Hiddingh’s campus prepared to rap on the third novel from “the best Afrikaans novelist to emerge in the last decade” – as Martin Seymour-Smith called Coetzee in late 70s, after the previous book, In the Heart of the Country, was first published.
The event serves as the coming out party for UCT English Department prof Caroll Clarkson’s new work on on the Nobel winner – pictured here as he is on the dust jacket of a first edition of Barbarians – called JM Coetzee: Countervoices.
From the blurb on Clarkson’s book:
Clarkson pays sustained attention to the dynamic interaction between Coetzee’s fiction and his critical writing, exploring the Nobel prize-winner’s participation in, and contribution to, contemporary literary-philosophical debates. The book sets out by examining Coetzee’s preoccupation with language, and opens onto a consideration of the ethical and aesthetic implications of the writer’s linguistic choices.
GIPCA’s Great Texts / Big Questions popular lecture series provides an opportunity to hear a leading intellectual discuss one of life’s “big questions” or a significant book or artwork. The great texts under discussion in Clarkson’s lecture are Waiting for the Barbarians and Disgrace. The publication of Waiting for the Barbarians confirmed Coetzee’s standing as a novelist of international repute; Disgrace is Coetzee’s most widely discussed – and his most controversial work, not least because of the novel’s winning of the Booker Prize in 1999, the charges of racism lodged against the novel at the Human Rights Commission, and the recent release of the film, Disgrace, starring John Malkovich.
Clarkson’s research interests lie in the philosophy of language and in post apartheid South African literature and art. Her most recent publication is her book on Coetzee, entitled J.M. Coetzee: Countervoices. In her GIPCA lecture she will be asking a big question about the limits of literary representation, with specific reference to Waiting for the Barbarians and Disgrace.
Thursday night saw the launch of Idasa’s 2010 Democracy Index, Testing Democracy alongside the opening of Lobby Books, a joint indie bookshop venture that is less about competition, as we previously reported, than it is about collaboration. Lobby Books is a partnership between Mervyn Sloman, of The Book Lounge, and Henrietta Dax, of Clarke’s Books.
The Fifth Annual Pride Book Fair was surely a highlight on 
Fiona Ross, of UCT’s Department of Social Anthropology, has penned the title 
