Alert!SA PEN has issued its call for entries for the £10 000 2011 PEN/Studzinsky Literary Awards – which are judged by JM Coetzee – and has announced that Margie Orford is set to replace Shaun Johnson on the PEN executive.
In a not-altogether-welcome shift of policy, SA PEN has reverted to the geographical scope of its award that was in place before it secured sponsorship from current benefactor John Studzinski. That is, only residents of SADC’s fifteen countries may enter, whereas the inaugural award was open to the whole of Africa. (See the press release below for the full list of eligible countries.) Happily, the lack of any age restriction on entrants appears to remain intact.
3 000 to 5 000 word short fiction entries in English are invited from 1 March 2010; submission details will be posted to the SA PEN website on that date; no final closing deadline appears to have yet been set.
Here’s the complete press release from SA PEN:
2011 PEN/STUDZINSKI LITERARY AWARDS
Entries invited from 1 March 2010
The South African Centre of International PEN (SA PEN) is pleased to announce the launch of the second in the series of PEN/STUDZINSKI Literary Awards.
Entries for the award for original short stories in English are called for from 1 March 2010 and AFRICAN PENS, a compilation of the short-listed stories, will be published in mid-2011.
Prizes totalling £10 000 will once again be donated by American philanthropist and global investment banker, John Studzinski. The first, second and third prizes will be £5 000, £3 000 and £2 000, respectively.
Nobel Laureate and SA PEN Honorary Member, J.M. Coetzee, will once again select the winning entries.
The 2011 PEN/STUDZINSKI Literary Award aims to encourage creative writing in southern Africa and will offer talented writers an exciting opportunity to launch or develop a literary career. Twelve contributors to our earlier HSBC/SA PEN series have now published their own books, including Ceridwen Dovey who won the 2008 Sunday Times Fiction Prize. Petina Gappah, an early winner, went on to sign a three-book contract with Faber & Faber in the UK and Farrar Strauss & Giroux in the US. Three of the five short-listed stories for the Caine prize for African Writing first appeared in AFRICAN PENS 2007 – the model for AFRICAN PENS 2011. The story POISON, set in a threatened Cape Town, and written by author Henrietta Rose-Innes, was chosen by J.M, Coetzee as the winner of the 2007 HSBC/SA PEN Literary Award and it went on to win the 2008 Caine Prize of £10 000.
Our 2009 project, led by author Shaun Johnson, received over 800 entries from writers throughout Africa, but this year we revert to appealing only to writers living in the fifteen countries of the Southern African Development Community (SADC*). The genre is still the short-story, this time between 3 000 and 5 000 words.
SA PEN is pleased to announce that author Margie Orford has agreed to take Shaun’s place on the SA PEN executive and that the Editorial Board for the 2011 award will comprise:
Anthony Fleischer (Chairman), novelist and President of SA PEN Dianne Case, popular children’s author John Gardener, English teacher, retired Head of Kingswood College & Bishops, published numerous articles and Bishops’ 150 year history of the school Jeremy Lawrence, writer who has worked in journalism and publishing in London and South Africa Adré Marshall, retired academic, author of book on Henry James and sundry poems, translator (French/English) Peter Merrington, novelist, professor extraordinaire at the University of the Western Cape, ceramicist and motorcyclist Margie Orford, writer and sometime journalist Anne Schuster, novelist, poet, creative writing facilitator and publisher J.M. Coetzee – Nobel Laureate (Final judge)
Writers who are citizens of SADC countries* are encouraged to prepare short stories for submission. Further information and detailed rules of entry will be posted on the SA PEN website, www.sapen.co.za, from the 1 March 2010. Previous publications featuring the shortlisted and winning stories from the 2005, 2006 and 2007 HSBC/SA PEN, and 2009 PEN/STUDZINSKI Literary Awards are: AFRICAN COMPASS (2005, New Africa Books), AFRICAN ROAD (2006, New Africa Books), AFRICAN PENS (2007, New Africa Books), NEW WRITING FROM AFRICA 2009 (2009, Johnson & KingJames Books).
* SADC countries: Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Alert! Perusers of this week’s Mail & Guardian may have noticed that the letters page contains a scathing attack by Paul Trewhela on Janet Smith and Beauregard Tromp, authors of the new Chris Hani biography, Hani: A life too short.
The M&G hasn’t put the letter online (yet), but a longer version of it has just appeared at Politicsweb – and, like the original, it carries the whiff of serving a dual purpose: first, as an aggressive (not to say openly hostile) act of setting the historical record straight; and second, as a lever for promoting Trewhela’s own book. The shortcomings that he finds in A life too short are remedied, he says, in his treatment of the ANC and SWAPO’s military prison system, Inside Quatro.
Trewhela’s attack appears to boil down to a claim that Smith and Tromp glossed over Hani’s supposed role in secret prison executions. A contest for control over the narrative of the struggle leader’s legacy, then:
There is a serious problem with the recently published biography, Chris Hani: A Life Too Short (Jonathan Ball, 2009), written by Janet Smith and Beauregard Tromp. Sello M Alcock hints at the problem but does not identify it in his review in the Mail & Guardian (16 October), when he notes that they “manage only to gloss over” certain complex episodes in Hani’s life in exile.
The authors are senior journalists in South Africa, which makes the matter more disturbing.
Smith is an executive editor of The Star, the premier daily newspaper in the country and the leading media organ of the Independent News & Media group. Tromp is a senior reporter on The Star. This year he won the Mondi Shanduka Newspaper Journalist of the Year award, the CNN African Print Journalist of the Year award and the Vodacom Regional Print News Journalist of the Year award.
Their biography of Chris Hani fails on a most basic criterion, however: integrity to sources.
The result is that complexities in Hani’s life are obscured, and not made properly accessible to the reader.
The crucial chapter concerns Hani’s relation to the mutiny of about 90 percent of the trained troops of Umkhonto we Sizwe in Angola in 1984, the incarceration of leaders of the mutiny in Quatro prison camp, and their subsequent fates.
The inaugural SADC Poetry Festival, held in Namibia, concluded earlier this week. From poetry readings on the streets of Windhoek to workshops and language sessions, much was contributed by the over 50 poets who attended. Keep an eye out for My Africa: My Home-Redefinition – the anthology born out of the festival – that is to be published in the coming months.
Here’s a wrap of the events from Zimbabwe’s Herald:
The inaugural three-day poetry festival that was held in Namibia ended on a high note here yesterday with participants calling for the re-integration of the region through art.
Running under the theme Chanting for Sadc, the poetry fiesta saw renowned poets from eight countries, namely Namibia, Swaziland, South Africa, Malawi, Angola, Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe not only taking to the podium to chant their works throughout Windhoek, but also served as an information launch pad where artistes where able to exchange notes and their experiences to strengthen and develop poetry in the region.
Poets and lovers of poetry alike are coming from all over southern Africa to Windhoek, Namibia, this weekend, for the inaugural SADC Poetry Festival. They’ll recite, compose – and also tackle a series of socio-literary issues, such as how to integrate poetry into mainstream education. SA’s own Khadija Tracey Heeger features in the mix:
The inaugural three-day SADC Poetry festival kicks off in Windhoek Friday with poets from the region gracing the event organised by artsinitiates-Zimbabwe and Township Productions of Namibia and funded by Prince Claus Fund of Netherlands.
The festival’s theme is Chanting for SADC.
Other partners are Franco-Namibian Cultural Centre, the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe, Lion Press (UK), Blackcherrie Entertainment and Gentlemen’s Club.
Poets coming for the event are Moffat Moyo and Milensu Kapaipi from Zambia; Cynthia Marangwanda from Zimbabwe, Keselofetse Ditsabatho and Tebogo Makgetla from Botswana, Silva Solunga from Angola, Phinda Mkhonta from Swaziland and Khadija Tracey Heeger from South Africa.
Ten poets – Vernon Clete, Sibali Kgobetsi, Libertida Jodd, Julia Amukoshi, Luna Ramphaga, Petrus Haakskeen, Lucky Pieters and Boli Mootseng – have confirmed participation.
On Friday, Namibia’s celebrated poet Mvula ya Nangolo will officially open the event before a workshop scheduled for Saturday at the FNCC where among others, Dr Francis Sifiso and University of Zimbabwe English lecturer, poet and author Memory Chirere as well as the National Theatre of Namibia Director Axaro Thaniseb will deliver papers.
September 12 marked twenty years since Anton Lubowski’s assassination in Klein Windhoek, Namibia. Catherine Sasman looks back on his life, with particular reference to some of the books that were published in the wake of his killing:
Anton Lubowski’s death remains shrouded in mystery, but his life is hailed as that of a human rights lawyer, trade unionist, staunch in his views against racism – a paradox of a man.
On September 12, 1989, bullets flying from a passing car struck Anton Lubowski as he alighted from his vehicle, briefcase in hand, in front of his home on Sanderburg Street, Klein Windhoek.
When he died, Lubowski was 37 years old, leaving behind Garbielle Schuster and his two young children, Almo and Nadia.
Six months after his assassination, author David Beresford wrote that the bullet holes were still in the garden gate where Lubowski died six months after his assassination.
At 95 years, Van Schaik Bookstore proves that books are a solid investment
With 45 stores throughout South Africa and an online store, supplying textbooks and reference books to students and professionals, Van Schaik Bookstore has good reason to celebrate 95 years in business this year, and its position as the leading specialist academic book chain in South Africa.
Van Schaik opened in 1914 with a small bookstore, specializing in Christian literature, magazines and stationery in Church Street, Pretoria. The following year the first book with the JL van Schaik imprint was published. The business went on to grow steadily in response to the increasing demand for academic books. In 1986, the business was sold to Via Afrika, the Naspers book division, and in October 2007, Van Schaik Bookstore became part of Avusa Retail, a division of Avusa Limited.
“It hasn’t all been plain sailing – Van Schaik Bookstore has grown into a successful retailer, but we weathered economic storms – After suffering a huge loss in 1993, the company was restructured in order to achieve profitability, developing systems to facilitate sustained growth. It took the commitment, hard work, brainpower and dedication of our staff to achieve profitability on a sustained basis. Our personnel embraced the company’s values in business and today our staff is certainly the company’s most valuable asset,” comments MD, Stephan Erasmus. (more…)
Alert!Budding Writers Namibia – BW Namibia for short – a group of young scribes learning the craft in Windhoek (and elsewhere), led by the intrepid Nabukenya Muwonge (first person on the left in the photo), has made the mainstream news in that country, garnering a New Era feature from journo Frederick Philander.
The group’s official launch was addressed by novelist Neshani Andreas, who spoke about how she got started as a writer. “… I discovered later that there was really no need for me to wait for ‘improved English or computer literacy or any other preconditions I set for myself,” she said, teaching a mighty lesson in a single sentence.
Congrats to Nabukenya and Co! Here’s the piece: (more…)
Frederick Philander recently attended a five-day conference on Namibian Literature at Windhoek’s Polytechnic of Namibia. The event, the first of its kind in the country, was held under the auspices of the Polytechnic Library and was opened by the Rector, Dr Tjama Tjivikua, who said it was the first academic effort to recognise and acknowledge 15 worthy Namibian writers since independence.
“This event provides a unique opportunity for all of us to be jubilant about Namibian literature in view of the fact that African oral history is dying, losing the essence of our own existence,” he said. (more…)
Often enough one has cause to wonder how the mind of a killer ticks. But, take this one step further, and ask yourself this: how does the mind of the “creator” of a killer tick?
That’s what Gareth Pike of The Times set out to discover in his interview with Margie Orford, author of two “killer” crime novels, Blood Rose and Like Clockwork.
If you’ve already fallen for Orford’s hero, Dr. Clare Hart, sleuth extraordinaire, you’ll enjoy this interview. If you haven’t yet discovered her, however, you will probably feel compelled to make an acquaintance after reading about the mind that made her up! (more…)
Alert! SA PEN has issued its call for entries for the £10 000 2011 PEN/Studzinsky Literary Awards – which are judged by JM Coetzee – and has announced that Margie Orford is set to replace Shaun Johnson on the PEN executive.
September 12 marked twenty years since Anton Lubowski’s assassination in Klein Windhoek, Namibia. Catherine Sasman looks back on his life, with particular reference to some of the books that were published in the wake of his killing:
Frederick Philander recently attended a five-day conference on Namibian Literature at Windhoek’s 
