Alumni with the Writing Edge

CHILDREN’S FICTION

A Kite’s Flight, by William Gumede

In a radical departure from his previous books, The Poverty of Ideas (with Leslie Dikeni, Jacana, 2009) and the best-seller Thabo Mbeki and the Battle for the Soul of the ANC (Random House Struik, 2005), political analyst William Gumede (MA Political Studies 2003) has published his first children’s book, A Kite’s Flight (Jacana, 2010). A father of three, Gumede is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Public and Development Management at Wits and former deputy editor of the Sowetan. A Kite’s Flight recounts the tale of a beautiful kite made by Andile and his father, which undertakes a sweeping, epic journey over Africa when the string breaks on its virgin flight. The kite traverses the thundering Victoria Falls, the snowy tops of Kilimanjaro, the Sahara desert and the pyramids, before eventually landing on a beach in Egypt. Published in nine South African languages, the book enables access to reading in children’s mother tongues. The book’s illustrations, by Maja Sereda, won the Crystal Kite Award (African region) from the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators in May 2011.

FICTION

Deeper than Colour, by James Clelland

A Scottish native but South African citizen, biochemist James McCulloch (MSc Med 1986), writing as James Clelland, won the EU Literary Award in 2010 for the manuscript of his debut novel, Deeper than Colour (Jacana, 2010). The novel has since been shortlisted for the UJ Literary Award and for the 2011 Sunday Times Literary Award. Deeper than Colour explores the wide gulf between our views of ourselves, how we are seen by others, and the dispassionate images seen through the cold lens of a camera. The protagonist, Angus, traumatised by his time on the border, begins to film himself doing ordinary things, to try to understand his life. It is impossible, he says, for an abnormal person to have a normal life in an abnormal city like Johannesburg. The novel deals with Angus’ passage from terminally disaffected husband to perversely inspired engineer of his own fate. Deeper than Colour recounts a tale seldom told in the new South Africa: the effects on the white population of supporting apartheid. The script also deals with difficult issues in South Africa’s new dispensation.

Jelly Dog Days, by Erica Emdon

Jelly Dog Days (Penguin, 2009) is the debut novel of Erica Emdon (BA 1977, BA Hons 1978, LLB 1988, MA 2008), a public-interest lawyer at an NGO for children’s and women’s rights. Jelly Dog Days emerged from Emdon’s Masters in creative writing at Wits, and was shortlisted for the 2010 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (Africa region). Based on Emdon’s interviews with women affected by familial abuse, Jelly Dog Days tells the story of 12-year-old Theresa ‘Terry’ Ryman’s dysfunctional childhood in a white, working class family in 1970s apartheid South Africa. Terry’s abandonment by her father as an infant sets the tone. Terry’s mother, Lizette, is an alcoholic who oscillates between doting mother and monster, while Terry’s stepfather, Piet, seemingly her only support, exacts a high price for his affection. The domestic worker, Sophie, emerges as the sole stabiliser inexorably drawn into the fray when her son, Rex, is involved in the 1976 riots. Terry’s grandparents represent the ultimate betrayal. Jelly Dog Days explores graphically how abuse can affect a young child, the complexities and dynamics of family relationships, survival and redemption.

NON-FICTION

Precarious Liberation: Workers, the State, and Contested Social Citizenship in Post-Apartheid South Africa, by Franco Barchiesi

A former lecturer in the Wits Sociology Department, Professor Franco Barchiesi (MA Sociology 1997, PhD Sociology 2006) has been Assistant Professor in the Department of African-American and African Studies at Ohio State University since 2005. Barchiesi’s research interest lies in the Southern African labour movements in relation to changing forms of employment, collective identities, civil society, social movements, and forms of social policy and social citizenship. His book, Precarious Liberation: Workers, the State, and Contested Social Citizenship in Post-Apartheid South Africa (University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, June 2011) focuses on these issues and is based on Barchiesi’s Wits PhD. Almost 20 years since democratisation, the prospect of a dignified life of wage-earning work remains elusive for most South Africans. Precarious Liberation interrogates the dilemma of government defining citizenship as economic participation, while the reality suggests that this is unrealistic, given the increasingly precarious nature of work. Barchiesi explores how reducing citizenship to wage labour has left the country’s working class defenceless. Through wage labourers’ voices, he explores how wage labour today typically provides uncertainty and resentment rather than stability and security.

POETRY

47 Poems, created from the poems of Mihai Eminescu, by James Moulder

Dr James Moulder (BA Hons Philosophy 1964) holds a PhD in philosophy from Rhodes University. He was formerly the Vice-Chancellor’s personal assistant and Director of Public Affairs at the University of Cape Town. A retired business school academic now based in Australia, Moulder has published interpretations of 47 poems by Romania’s national poet, Mihai Eminescu (1850-1889). Rather than attempting to “translate the untranslatable” Moulder has used the Romantic poet’s works as the inspiration for creating his own 47 Poems (Episcopiei Argeşului şi Muscelului, 2011). These forgo the literal translation in favour of attempting to capture the essence of Eminescu’s poetry. Moulder’s list includes major poems such as Luceafărul (“Evening Star”, 1884) and Sara pe deal (“Evening on the Hill”, 1885), as well as Cu gândiri şi cu imagini, of which Moulder’s interpretation reads: “don’t rest your mind in mine, it’s full of mistakes, it’s full of absurd dreams”. The poems are available online at http://www.47poems.blogspot.com/. Moulder is currently working with Romanian actors and dancers on an Eminescu musical.