Category Archives: What I’ve Written

Book review: The Death’s Head Chess Club by John Donoghue

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Deaths Head Chess ClubA friend has recently suggested that my reluctance to read Second World War novels might be similar to many South Africans’ reluctance to read apartheid fiction, and that saturation might be at the heart of it. True, having grown up in Poland and Austria, I have heard, seen and read plenty about the war – the stories as related by both sides. It is not that I shy away from the horror, even though after having visited the Mauthausen concentration camp as a teenager I was unable to accompany my husband when he wanted to see the concentration camp in Auschwitz (throughout, I sat very still in a coffee shop just outside and wept without going in). Imagination and empathy can be deadly for a soul. But I understand that these (hi)stories must be told and listened to. Today, in the midst of xenophobia, racism and violence, we need to grasp, perhaps even more than ever, what is at stake when we declare others as subhuman…

Continue reading: LitNet

The Death’s Head Chess Club
by John Donoghue
Atlantic Books, 2015

Reading Paul Morris’s Back to Angola: A Journey from War to Peace

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Back to Angola…without language we are left to watch each other carefully…
– Paul Morris

I went to see it twice. I still don’t really understand why, but Anthony Akerman’s Somewhere On the Border (1983) moved me deeply. The scene when Bombardier Kotze crushes the conscripts’ cake with his boot still haunts me.

When you think about it for a second, war is so pointless that it’s impossible to imagine why we are still doing it in the twenty-first century. I don’t mean the greed and politics behind it, nor the ideologies abused to wage it – I get all of that. I mean the everyday, human aspect of it.

No, as a species we haven’t learned much.

I have this fantasy that, like during that famous Christmas Truce of 1914, one day soldiers all over the world will be compelled to simply put down all their weapons, exchange smiles, and go home to their loved ones. And never, ever pick them up again. Not because some government or leader has said they shouldn’t, but because they simply have had enough. I know I will never live to see the day, but just imagine it: it is a simple as that – a communal decision, a definite, ultimate NO. To greed, exploitation, violence and death.

Reading Paul Morris’s Back to Angola: A Journey from War to Peace (Zebra Press, 2014), I was constantly reminded of my naïve fantasy, of the heart-breaking Somewhere on the Border, of my grandfather’s dark recollections of Second World War, of my father’s mindboggling stories from his two years in the Polish Army around the time when I was born, of my brother’s strangely defining eight months of service in the Austrian Army when we were at university, and especially of a dear South African friend’s horror stories from the Angolan border. I am infinitely grateful that, to me, these are just stories. That I have never had to experience war or train for it myself. I hope I never will. The war stories I know, now Morris’s among them, bring home to me how, if it doesn’t kill you, soul-destroying and utterly futile war is.

In the beginning of Back to Angola, Morris mentions that he doesn’t consider himself a brave man. But only a brave man could have written this book. It is “my truth”, he says, but it is the kind of personal intimate truth which has universal appeal. A quarter of a century after his first involuntary visit to Angola in 1987 at the height of the military conflict, Morris decided to return to the country of his nightmares and confront what he refers to his “shadow side”. To fully experience the present-day Angola and to come as close as possible to its people, he chose an unusual way of travelling and went by bike. Assisted by friends and former enemies, he cycled for hundreds of kilometres to revisit the places haunting him and to transform the sinister image of Angola of the past into something different, more positive, more real today.

It is a parallel journey into the past and into the present; both have their challenges, both require guts, a lot of guts. During both, Morris confronts his understanding of courage, masculinity, loyalty, borders, and forgiveness. Confessional, shatteringly honest, beautifully written, Back to Angola tells a story of great relevance, specifically because it is told from a profoundly personal perspective. It captures the essence of why an entire generation of South African men is still dealing with the unimaginable.

A story about death is transformed into a story about life and facing up to one’s demons and responsibilities. It is a story of reaching out, of going back only to move forward. Back to Angola is also a chronicle of a riveting adventure in contemporary Africa. Not an easy read, but necessary. Highly recommendable.

Review: Sam and Me and the Hard Pear Tree by Jami Yeats-Kastner

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sam_and_me_hard_pear_tree_covGrief is a curious creature. When you lose a beloved person, everything changes. You even have to learn to breathe anew. None of it is predictable. The process is highly individual. Reading Jami Yeats-Kastner’s heart-wrenching memoir about the death of Sam, her youngest son, was perhaps not the wisest choice for me after having experienced the greatest loss of my life, the death of my husband. Yeats-Kastner’s journey, however, is very different. Yet her story resonated with me in unexpected ways and gave me a measure of comfort.

“The Day It Happened” for Yeats-Kastner and her family was 8 February 2013. Her eighteen-months-old son drowned in their pool. That day she became the “Crazybutterflylady”, guided by signs in the form of butterflies on her path to acceptance and to herself.

As my favourite philosopher Mark Rowlands says: “To be at our best we have to be pushed into a corner, where there is no hope and nothing to be gained from going on. And we go on anyway.” Yeats-Kastner repeats the sentiment in the opening of her book: “Sometimes you need to be completely broken to find the most powerful part of yourself.”

As she notes, losing a child is “universally accepted” to be the greatest of pains. It is the loss of a life not lived, of the immense potential and its beauty. It is unbearable. Those left behind live in a void that is undefined: “If you lose your parents you’re an orphan; if you lose your husband you’re a widow. But what is the name for us, the broken ones? There isn’t one, because people can’t accept that it should happen.”

What Yeats-Kastner shows is how to transform the heartache of such a loss into a force for good. She seeks out messages which lead her on a path of discovery. She realises that in order to continue a meaningful life, to be a good mother to her other two sons (one of whom has severe low muscle tone), to be a loving wife and a fulfilled person, she needs to preserve her space and cultivate her creativity. Not afraid of what others might think of her, she pursues all avenues – whether spiritual, religious, or alternative – to achieve her goals. Together with friends, she starts a charity in her son’s name and learns to appreciate “life’s great truths”.

Nothing is easy. Guilt feelings persist. Reproach from others has to be confronted. There are days where everything seems impossible. Yeats-Kastner confronts it all with searing honesty and does not flinch, simply asking that we do not judge her too easily. She describes her family’s ordeal and their courage to find a new life. They move house, take up new professional challenges, and follow the butterflies which seem to appear out of the blue, but are in fact constantly around you if you are bold enough to look for and acknowledge them.

Sam and Me and the Hard Pear Tree is a moving memoir of survival, healing and hope.

Sam and Me and the Hard Pear Tree
by Jami Yeats-Kastner
Jacana, 2014

Review first published in the Cape Times, 2 April 2015, p. 24.

Even better: Best of second half of 2014 book giveaway

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GiveawayIn July last year, I listed here my best reads of the first half of 2014 and gave one of the titles away to a randomly chosen person who commented on the post. The lucky winner was Solomon Meyer and I sincerely hope he has enjoyed his copy of The Maze Runner.

I would like to do the same for the second half of 2014 which turned out to be an even greater reading success than the first. Old friends & new discoveries made the list. I decided, however, to concentrate on fiction & non-fiction only. In no particular order:

?????????????????????????I love historical fiction and it hardly ever comes better than Claire Robertson’s The Spiral House (Umuzi, 2013). I heard Robertson speak at the FLF last year and was immediately intrigued. During the festival, the novel was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Fiction Prize and won subsequently to my, and many other readers’, delight. Written in a mesmerising prose which takes you into the heart of local history, the novel is a rare gem which should not be missed. Apart from anything else it is such a beautifully produced book. Well done, Umuzi!

The VisitorAnother historical title, Katherine Stansfield’s The Visitor (Parthian, 2014), will feature on all my favourites lists for a long time to come. I had the pleasure of reviewing it for the Cape Times. A gift from Robert, a dear friend with whom I studied and practised fencing at the University of Wales in Aberystwyth, this beautiful debut novel came to me when it was most needed. Set in a fictional fishing village in Cornwall towards the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, it tells the story of three friends and their community. The sea is their constant companion and witness to the love, loss and longing unfolding at its shore. Last year, I wrote an essay about the sea and its influence on my own life as a woman and a writer. The Visitor has triggered many memories and helped me focus on the task at hand. Stansfield is also a remarkable poet. Her debut collection Playing House is a delight.

People's PlatformI love engaging with the internet even though I am deeply aware of its pitfalls. I still remember AltaVista, the first chat rooms, or waiting for a page to open for twenty minutes (if you were lucky!) while doing my homework on the side. I have been fascinated by the medium for nearly as long as it exists on a global scale. The People’s Platform – Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age by Astra Taylor (Fourth Estate, 2014) is one of those must reads if you want to consciously participate in the digital age and not be simply reduced to a consumer, abused by power and greed. Culture is one of our most precious resources and treasures. To allow it to waste away in this precarious environment is criminal.

Dont Film YourselfAnother must for the internet age: Don’t Film Yourself Having Sex and Other Legal Advice for the Age of Social Media (Penguin, 2014) by Emma Sadleir and Tamsyn de Beer looks at the legal implications of our interaction with social media. The authors spell out the dos and don’ts of the diverse platforms: Twitter, Facebook, etc. The book is informative and strangely enough very funny despite telling some very grim internet stories of people losing their reputations, jobs, friends and serious money over online blunders. Also essential reading for anyone wanting to marry Kate Winslet.

Divided LivesAnybody who reads me will know how much I admire Lyndall Gordon‘s work. Her latest, Divided Lives (Virago, 2014), raises my admiration to another level. Just looking at the shelf where I keep all her wise, powerful biographies and memoirs reassures me. She has brought so much sustenance and joy into my life as a reader, writer and woman that I am certain I would be a very different, and much poorer, Karina today without having encountered her books. May there be many more to come.

adultsonlycoverA rather racy read, and not all the stories in this anthology were my cup of tea, but there were some which I found very exciting, on the literary not literal level, of course ;) Showcasing some of the talent we have here in South Africa, these erotic short stories cater for nearly all tastes. Funny, thrilling, and exquisite at times, it is a rewarding read (see my review: Adults Only – Stories of Love, Lust, Sex and Sensuality edited by Joanne Hichens, Mercury, 2014).

A_Man_of_Good_Hope_frontA Man of Good Hope (Jonathan Ball, 2014) is Jonny Steinberg at his best. I have a friend who says that when she grows up she wants to be Jonny Steinberg, and I can’t blame her. In his latest, Steinberg tells the story of a man on the most remarkable journey which takes him from Mogadishu via South Africa to even more distant shores. Asad Abdullahi goes through hell and back and on his trip teaches us what it means to hope and dream when it seems that all is in vein. I listened to and interviewed Steinberg during the Open Book Festival last year. For my reflections on the festival see “The Image of a Pie”.

invisible_furies_coverAnother of my favourite authors, Michiel Heyns, launched A Sportful Malice at the FLF last year and the novel featured in my July giveaway, but later in the year I turned to his previous title, Invisible Furies (Jonathan Ball, 2012) and enjoyed it just as much, not only because it is set in my beloved Paris. After a long absence, Christopher travels to Paris where he encounters a world of beauty and intrigue. He is there to help Eric, the son of a friend, come to his senses and return to South Africa. But Eric has some surprises in store for him. Nothing is what it seems in the City of Love.

The Snowden FilesThe Snowden Files – The Inside Story of the World’s Most Wanted Man by Luke Harding (Guardian Books/Faber and Faber, 2014) is another eye-opener when it comes to the workings of the internet and governments all over the world. Harding reveals the background to the Snowden story and all its scary implications. A tense read of history unfolding in front of our eyes. I hope there will be a follow-up book and some kind of decent resolution to this saga on all fronts.

The Alibi ClubA discovery from last year’s Open Book Festival, Jaco van Schalkwyk’s The Alibi Club (Umuzi, 2014) is one of the most refreshing South African fiction debuts of the last few years. Set in New York in the decade around 9/11, it tells the story of a South African working at a club and interacting with its regulars in the heart of Brooklyn. Tight, impact prose, distinct characters, well-paced storytelling – the stuff of a great promise. I am very curious what Van Schalkwyk will do next.

Travels with EpicurusNot only a delightful book, but a reminder of what good booksellers are for: Travels with Epicurus – Meditations from a Greek Island on the Pleasures of Old Age (Oneworld, 2013) by Daniel Klein was recommended to me by Johan Hugo from the Protea Bookshop in Rondebosch. Johan and I have been talking books for years now, so he knows what André or I might enjoy. With this enlightening read he was spot on for both of us. We literally devoured the little book. It is one of those that makes you feel good about the world and your place in it. And it was only written because of Klein’s initial fear of acquiring dentures… Inspiration is a curious thing indeed.

LullabyThis is also a book Johan introduced me to, knowing that I would be interested in another Polish-speaking author writing in English: Anna’s family emigrates in the 1980s before the changeover in Poland and settles in New York. Missing her roots and extended family, every summer Anna returns to Poland on her own and spends the holidays in her old neighbourhood where she befriends Justyna and Kamila. Together, they survive the ups and downs of puberty: jealousies, hang-ups about their developing bodies, the turbulences of first loves, budding sexualities and substance abuse. Some things go horribly wrong and one day Anna refuses to come back for another visit. Years later, another tragedy brings the three friends together again. Poland is undergoing its own transition while the young women face the new reality and try to pick up the pieces of their broken dreams. The Lullaby of Polish Girls (Quercus, 2013) by Dagmara Dominczyk is a fast-paced story of growing up in a migratory world.

MoonTigerI have a friend whom I see roughly once a year for coffee or lunch. Every our encounter inspires me and gives me food for thought for the next year. The last time we spoke, Penelope Lively came up and he recommended that I read Moon Tiger (André Deutsch, 1987). I have read some of Lively’s other novels and there was even a time when I contemplated writing a thesis on her work, but it was not meant to be. Moon Tiger, however, made me want to go back to her writing again. It is an intense, beautiful study of the nature of history with a grand love story at its centre.

TalesAnother local novel that made a huge impact on me this year: Imraan Coovadia’s Tales of the Metric System (Umuzi, 2014). I was asked to review it for LitNet and decided to do some catch-up Coovadia reading in the process, which proved most entertaining. But this latest is, for me, Coovadia’s best up to date. We speak about ‘post-apartheid’ fiction all the time, but I sometimes wonder how many novels deserve the title in the sense that they have been truly written from that perspective. Tales of the Metric System is definitely one of them.

The DigAn absolute highlight of last year’s and this year’s reading is the discovery of the Welsh author, Cynan Jones. I subscribe to the New Welsh Review. I was reading an old issue of the magazine which included a review of Jones’s rewriting of a Welsh myth, Bird, Blood, Snow (Seren, 2012) and I was intrigued. I googled, as one does, and found that he’d written a novel with a central Polish character, Everything I Found on the Beach (Parthian, 2011). A Welsh author writing a Polish character was too much to resist, so I ordered the novel and Jones’s latest, The Dig (Granta, 2014). Last night, I started The Long Dry (Parthian, 2007) and am enthralled by it like by the other two titles. In the meantime, I have discovered that Jones has also published two other novels which might be tricky to get since they seem to be out of print, but I am patient and persistent, and eventually, I intend to write a longer piece about his work. Literary discoveries get seldom better than this. I am a fan for life.

Station ElevenEmily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven (Picador, 2014) was sent to me for reviewing. Also a writer to watch out for. The novel is speculative fiction at its finest and belongs with the Atwoods & Le Guins of the literary world. It is a genre which has always appealed to me and I hope to write in it myself one day. Station Eleven tells the story of a handful of survivors of a lethal flu which wipes out most of the human race. Disturbing and touching at the same time, it contemplates the big questions in life while telling a gripping story.

The Night WatchmanRichard Zimler has been a friend since we first corresponded about The Children’s Hours: Stories of Childhood. His work is an inspiration. I have been a fan for years. His latest novel, The Night Watchman (Corsair, 2014), is set in Portugal, but it tells a very familiar story of abuse, power, corruption and the sense of hopelessness we all face in this world when confronted with any of these evils. Zimler never goes for easy answers. His stories are nuanced, beautifully written (he is a master of dialogue) and always full of life’s wisdoms. It is an honour to know and to read him.

D&DTokoloshe SongTwo local friends, Alex Smith and her partner, Andrew Salomon, have published novels last year with Umuzi (again, gorgeous covers): Devilskein and Dearlove, Tokoloshe Song. Both are fantasy novels, very different though, but equally entertaining. Most days I am not a fantasy fan, but when it is done well, like these two heart-warming and enchanting books, even a non-believer’s heart melts. I loved the characters, their unusual universes filled with magic and wonder, and their stories which kept me spell-bound. I might convert after all!

Devil's HarvestAnd speaking of the devil, Andrew Brown’s Devil’s Harvest (Zebra Press, 2014) is not an easy read. Heart-wrenching and honest, it tells the story of a British botanist and a Sudanese woman who is a survivor of a genocide. The story of their journey through South Sudan is one of those that had to be written and has to be read. Brown did an excellent job at making sure that it is not forgotten. This was my first of his novels, and certainly not the last. Something to look forward to in 2015!

OctoberAn accidental encounter on twitter, of all places, revealed that I share a publisher with Réney Warrington. October (Protea Book House, 2013) is a subtle love story of how two damaged women struggle through emotional numbness to find a way back to life. The photographer Jo is shell-shocked by the divorce of her parents and her sister’s homophobia. When she meets the famous pop singer Leigh who has to overcome a serious illness and a troubled past, Jo does not expect to ever heal again. Despite serious doubts, they decide to give their relationship at least a fleeting chance…
Warrington is also a photographer and October includes a few startling images that poignantly illustrate the narrative.

This DayAnother twitter encounter resulted in my reading this meticulously crafted novel about a day in the life of a grieving woman. Having lived through the worst imaginable ordeal for a parent, Ella now has to take care of her husband who is suffering from severe depression. As each heart-breaking day dawns, she leaves massages in the sand for the sea to wash away. It is in the water that she also confronts her deepest hopes and worst fears. Poetic, full of insights, and simply beautiful, Tiah Beautement’s This Day (Modjaji Books, 2014) is an remarkable achievement.

Please let me know:
1) which books have made such an impact on you in the second half of 2014 that you wanted to share them with others?
2) which of the titles I’ve mentioned above you would be interested in reading yourself?
From your comments, I’ll draw one name at the beginning of February 2015 and send you the book you have chosen from the list of my favourite titles.
(Just to clarify, it seems this wasn’t clear: The winner will get a brand-new copy of the book they chose from my list.)

Christmas Story: Mrs Obama’s Garden

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‘Rubbish!’ Nkosi spat out. Drunk, he stood before Zuki with crumpled Christmas gift paper piling around his naked feet. He tossed the last of the presents, still partly wrapped, across the room. ‘Rich people’s rubbish,’ he hissed and fell back on his bed. A few seconds later he began to snore.

Zuki surveyed the scene before her. Nkosi had just come back from one of his ‘trips to town’, as he and his buddies called their looting excursions to the affluent suburbs of the city. They never went for anything big, specialising in petty crime only. But the last trip had been a total disappointment. They’d cruised for hours without an opportunity presenting itself until, at last, they saw a woman put a heavy box into the boot of her 4×4 and return to her house without locking the car. Nkosi grabbed the box and they made their escape. At least that is what Zuki had gathered from her brother’s earlier rant.

Now, the contents of the box lay strewn in front of her and Zuki felt a pang of guilt when she imagined how it would feel to discover the box gone. She picked up a piece of the Christmas paper which had landed near the door. Half a gift card was still attached to it. Zuki fingered it and straightened out the wrapping around it. One by one, Zuki traced the letters with her forefinger, deciphering them with some effort and pronouncing them softly under her breath: ‘TO KRISTIN AND WIGGO FROM…’ The giver’s name was missing.

Zuki crouched and retrieved the object which had so infuriated her brother. She hugged the stolen present to her chest. On tiptoe she made her way back to the sofa in the front of the house where she slept. The air was stagnant with the summer heat. Her father was asleep in the only other room.

The full moon illuminated the sofa through the window. Once settled, Zuki finished unwrapping the present and found herself staring into the lovely face of the American First Lady whom she’d recently seen on TV during the coverage of the her husband’s re-election campaign. She suddenly realised that she hadn’t properly held a book since dropping out of school three years ago when her mother died and Zuki took over her work as a char at Ms Murray’s. Ms Murray had shelves and shelves of books in her house, but Zuki only ever approached them with a feather duster.

Michelle ObamaPointing out the letters with her finger, Zuki gradually made out the title of the book and smiled. On the cover, Mrs Obama held a basket full of vegetables in all the colours of the rainbow. Even though Zuki did not recognise most of the vegetables, the picture made her mouth water. Especially the cucumber. In summer, Ms Murray often made cucumber sandwiches for her tea and always shared them with Zuki.

Inside the book, Zuki found many more photographs of Mrs Obama, surrounded by children, working in a garden, all busy with wheelbarrows and spades and rakes, then proudly showing off their vegetables in front of the camera. The people in the book appeared so relaxed and happy.

Zuki hadn’t known happiness since her mother’s death. Although it was difficult to admit, deep down inside she knew that her father was a drunk, her brother a chancer, and that her mother died because her father ordered her to visit a witchdoctor when she discovered lumps in her breast, instead of taking her to a clinic. But Zuki preferred not to dwell on things beyond her control. She was grateful for a roof over her head and didn’t mind giving most of her earnings to her father, just as long as he left her enough to feed them all. Even if what they could afford was mostly umngqusho or rice.

In one of the photographs, Mrs Obama was crouching next to a patch of plants Zuki did not recognise. The small-print text next to the picture looked daunting. At the top of the page, spelling the words carefully to herself, Zuki could make out a caption: “How Times Have Changed”.

In her dreams that night Zuki was in a garden and suddenly found herself face to face with the First Lady who held out to her a funny-shaped, purple vegetable. ‘Do you know what this is?’ Mrs Obama asked her. Zuki had to shake her head.

Waking up she felt her stomach grumble. Her dream made her feel ashamed. She hid Mrs Obama’s book under her sofa.

At work that day, Ms Murray was surprised to find Zuki paging through the commemorative U.S. election special issue of Time magazine. Ms Murray had not liked the idea of Zuki being torn out of school to work for her, but understood the situation and was glad that there had been at least something she could do for the family when her mother passed away. Zuki had never complained or indicated that she missed school, so it somehow surprised Ms Murray to see her looking so intently at the magazine in front of her, pointing, and mouthing the letters which stood to attention before her nail. She was so absorbed that in answer to Ms Murray’s hello she jumped up from her chair, spilling the remains of her tea over the magazine.

‘I didn’t mean to scare you,’ Ms Murray said and turned on the kettle.

Apologising, Zuki started wiping off her tea from the full-spread picture of the American First Family.

‘Don’t worry,’ her employer assured her. ‘I’m finished with it. You are welcome to have it when it’s dry.’

Zuki hesitated.

‘Are you happy that Obama was re-elected?’ Ms Murray asked unexpectedly. They had never talked politics before.

‘I know very little about –’ Zuki paused.

‘But you are interested to find out, I see.’

‘I’m not good at – ’

‘Reading?’ Ms Murray probed and Zuki nodded tentatively.

‘But you seem eager to?’

Zuki remembered the book at home and nodded again.

‘You know, I could help you,’ Ms Murray said. ‘Would you like that?’ she added carefully.

Zuki raised her eyes. In them Ms Murray found her answer.

In the afternoon, still glowing from the offer, Zuki went outside with a cool drink for Ms Murray’s gardener.

‘Do you mind if I take some of these home?’ she asked, pointing at some plants which resembled the ones she remembered from Mrs Obama’s book.

Alone on her sofa late that night, Zuki opened Mrs Obama’s garden book and held the thyme and rosemary twigs close to her nose. She smelled change in the palm of her hand.

***

Originally published as “Mevrou Obama se tuin” in By on 21 December 2013.

Review: Synapse by Antjie Krog

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SynapseReading Antjie Krog’s latest volume of poetry translated into English, Synapse (Mede-wete in Afrikaans), I was faced with an old personal dilemma: How much hard work is too much in order to reach that moment where meaning and aesthetic pleasure reveal themselves to you as a poetry reader? I don’t have an adequate answer. Perhaps everyone’s threshold is different anyway. In the end all you have is your very individual frame of reference, as a friend recently reminded me.

In any poetry volume you will find poems which will immediately speak to you. Others will require a specific key to unlock a feeling of appreciation. Rereading, research, or exploration of context will eventually reward your effort. Some poems will forever remain inaccessible no matter the amount of goodwill you put in. And then there will be those which will simply leave you cold. The poems in Synapse fit into all these categories.

The volume is divided into two parts: The Yard and Four Efforts in Linguistic Synapse Tracing. The first part opens with a series of epigraphs which are followed by thirteen poems, all focused on the images of the yard and the farm. These I find the strongest and most captivating in the book. In the epigraphs we are introduced to spaces in which the land and its ownership take centre stage and gender roles are clearly defined. The poems speak of the death of a patriarch, familial roots which reach into a troubled past, grief, guilt, race relations, and the ancient questions of owning and belonging.

As the poem 11. fossilised tree trunk makes clear, everything is connected, embedded, echoed throughout history. And yet, everything changes: “after all the years we gurgle (the only outlasting ones) / burdened with the dying light and bloodsick with heritage / : the new ones prepare to enter the yard” (13. old yard). At the heart of one’s relationship with the land are beauty and language: “places that could always snap my skeleton into language / coil me into voices bore into my entrails / expose a certain wholeness of belonging as my deepest tongue / tear chorales and something like discord from my brain” (6. live the myth).

This is the kind of poetry that leaves one gasping for air, which opens up new spaces in one’s understanding and feeling about the past and everyday reality in this country.

The Yard continues with poems which grapple with morality and reconciliation. The idea of interconnectedness is challenged in hold your ear to the tear in the skin of my country where already the format of the poem signals separate spheres of understanding the concept of forgiveness. The words of the speaker of the first section, Cynthia Ngewu, who testified in front of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission about the murder of her son, one of the Guguletu Seven, cascade onto the page like a waterfall. The neat couplets which follow represent an ordered attempt to understand the motives and worldviews of the officer who was involved in the killing. In the end, we are told, “it was futile to try to weave interconnectedness into / the concrete bunker that lives inside Mr Barnard’s whiteness”.

The bleakness of moving beyond such divisions is captured in miracle where South Africa’s relatively peaceful liberation is juxtaposed with present-day, all-consuming greed and violence: “we have become the prey of ourselves caught up / in ethnic avarice and total incapacity for vision”.

More intimate poems about ageing, memory, grand-motherhood, domesticity, or the I-you constellation of lovers reveal the wonders of the world along deeper philosophical questions about our capabilities and responsibilities. The tone ranges from sombre to light-hearted. Krog is one of the few poets out there who can smuggle Skype, wifi, the Internet and memory sticks into poetry and make them look as if they almost belonged. Also, when she swears, she makes it count.

The poem convivium astounds with its breadth: “what use my caress in the breath-earthed night if a centre- / less universe opens space in the nonexistent for dark / matter to overpower a few broken beads of light?” The poem, like the human body at the core of its universe, “tuneforks such abundance”.

Apart from a handful exceptions, especially the Lament on the death of Mandela, the latter part of the volume, specifically the obfuscated Four Efforts in Linguistic Synapse Tracing left me baffled. The tightness and clarity of the preceding poems dissolved in musings where it became more and more difficult to follow the poet on her journey. The academic in me insisted I persevere and come to grips with the pieces, but the Sunday morning reader just wanted to return to the earlier poems in the collection or open another book. The Sunday morning reader won.

Synapse
by Antjie Krog
translated by Karen Press
Human & Rousseau, 2014

A ‘butchered’ version of this review appeared in the Cape Times on 19 December 2014, p. 12.

Book mark: Tokoloshe Song by Andrew Salomon

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Tokoloshe SongJust when he thought that his life is going to be all peace and quiet after giving up a career as a lawyer to restore old boats, Richard is called in for an emergency at the shelter for mistreated tokoloshes where he volunteers. There he meets Lun. After a false start, they become friends and embark on a roller-coaster adventure which takes them across the country to Nieu Bethesda and back in search of the grain of truth at the heart of an ancient myth. They receive assistance from Emily and Sindiwe, midwives of a secret order. Hot on their heels are a ruthless drug lord and a world-class assassin.
I’m not a fantasy fan, but I have enjoyed some of Salomon’s award-winning short fiction. Tokoloshe Song is his debut novel for adults and is as delightful and entertaining as his stories.

Tokoloshe Song
by Andrew Salomon
Umuzi, 2014

Book mark: Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

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Station ElevenWithin a short period of time a lethal flu wipes out 99% of the world’s population. Civilisation as we know it grinds to an abrupt halt. Station Eleven tells the story of a handful of survivors of the mayhem which ensues. At its centre is the resourceful Kirsten of the Travelling Symphony, a group of actors and musicians performing Shakespeare.

Spanning a few decades before and after the collapse, Mandel draws a bleak picture of humanity, but the darkness is penetrated by flashes of light and goodwill. Creativity, art, self-expression pave the way to society’s precarious rebirth as the individual characters realise how strongly the drive to be remembered is anchored within them. A thrilling page-turner which is simultaneously though-provoking and entertaining, Station Eleven is being deservedly compared to the likes of Margaret Atwood. This is speculative fiction at its best.

Station Eleven
by Emily St. John Mandel
Picador, 2014

Christmas Story: A Silver Spoon

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IMGP2891Sanna never liked polishing the silver. She would have preferred to iron the white damask tablecloth the new Mrs Joubert brought over from home. She told Sanna her mother had given it to her as a parting present. Sanna listens to the huffs and puffs of the iron in the next room. She puts aside the last spoon and continues with the forks. Forks are tricky. You have to work the cloth carefully around the tines; the task is too much for her impatient chubby fingers. She takes a deep breath, trying to keep her cool. A cinnamony smell penetrates her nostrils. She looks at the big pot of stewing dried fruit, bubbling happily on the stove. It could also be the half-moon cookies Missus has put in the oven.

Rubbing Silvo into the cutlery, Sanna thinks of going home this afternoon; of her sister’s house in Worcester; the kitchen there buzzing with activities; her nieces and nephews, eagerly awaiting the next morning. She takes a sip of coffee Mrs Joubert has made for her before ironing. She still cannot get used to the idea of having anything served to her, especially not by the Missus – or Zosia, as she insists on being called. Old Mrs Joubert would never even have thought of it. But this one, this one was not born and bred here; she is different with her strange European ways. Sanna likes her.

In the other room, Zosia glides the iron over the intricate patterns of the white tablecloth. She breathes in the damp, warm smell of ironing. Her mother taught her to do it, insisting early on that she must know how to take care of herself. Housework always makes Zosia feel close to her. In this house, having Sanna to do most of it for her is difficult to get used to, but she understands the necessity of providing her with a job. When the tablecloth is ready, Zosia walks to the dining room holding it up between her outstretched arms. She places it carefully on the table and smoothes it around the edges with her hands. She puts the red placemats she bought for the occasion on top. She can already see how beautiful the silver will look on them.

‘Sanna, how are you coming along?’ Zosia calls into the kitchen.

‘Almost ready,’ Sanna replies, polishing the last knife.

Zosia puts long red candles on the table, then takes out some plates and glasses from the side cupboard. As Sanna comes through with the cutlery a few minutes later, Zosia is busy placing red and silver cone-shaped napkins into the neatly arranged soup plates.

Sanna sees the three placemats and is perplexed, but remains silent in her inscrutable way. Zosia smiles at her raised eyebrows and, bending over the table to put another wineglass into place, explains: ‘We have a tradition in Poland. On Christmas Eve, we always set the table for one extra person, just in case somebody stops by.’

Sanna shakes her head slowly, placing the cutlery next to the plates. ‘The most important Christmas meal on the 24th; twelve different dishes; no meat, just fish; waiting for the first star in the sky to appear before sitting down to dinner; opening presents on Christmas Eve; setting the table for a guest who never comes…’ In her head, Sanna repeats the list of strange customs Zosia has told her about in the last few days.

Seeing the dubious look on Sanna’s face, Zosia continues, arranging a few fir twigs around the tall candles. ‘There is a German saying, Andere Länder, andere Sitten. Other countries, other customs. I won’t be cooking twelve dishes for Johan and me tonight though,’ she reassures Sanna. ‘But there won’t be any meat, and we’ll have to cheat about the first star. We’ll starve if we wait for one to appear in this summer sky,’ Zosia looks outside. ‘In Europe we have snow for Christmas,’ she says and turns back to Sanna, ‘What is your sister cooking for your family?’

‘Chicken.’ Sanna does not say more. The single word fills her memory with smells and sounds of home and she looks at the grandfather’s clock in the dining room. Zosia catches the furtive glance. ‘You must be eager to go. Please, could you just vacuum the lounge and put the fresh linen on I have laid out on our bed.’ Before Sanna turns away, she adds, ‘Thank you,’ and, ‘I will make a small salad for us for lunch, and make sure that Johan remembers about taking you to the station on time.’

The ancient Hoover reminds Sanna of the old Mrs Joubert, always insisting on having the house vacuumed daily. She never said ‘please’ or ‘thank you.’ She passed away at the beginning of the year. After the funeral Johan decided to move back home with his outlandish wife whom he had married overseas without inviting the family. His mother never forgave him for it.

Sanna tucks the duvet in underneath the mattress and smoothes over the bed before putting the pillows in place. She hears Zosia call that lunch is ready. In the kitchen, she picks up her plate and takes it to her room in the back of the house where she always eats alone.

‘I wish she’d join us,’ Zosia tells her husband sitting at the kitchen table.

‘Years of conditioning. And you know how shy she is; give her time.’

Zosia sighs impatiently.

In her room, Sanna enjoys the salad. Her little suitcase is packed and ready to go. An extra bag leans on it. With the unexpectedly generous Christmas bonus she has bought some treats for her family.
Sanna wants to wash up the dishes after lunch, but Zosia tells her to leave them. ‘I can do it, no problem, and Johan is ready to take you to the station.’

‘Thank you,’ Sanna says and before she turns to go adds a shy ‘Merry Christmas’.

‘And merry Christmas to you, too. Enjoy your holiday, Sanna. We’ll see you after New Year.’ Zosia walks up to her and gives her a cautious hug. Sanna does not know how to react. She rushes out of the kitchen.
At the station, the bus is late. Johan insists on staying until it arrives, but Sanna tells him not to worry and to go back home. Half an hour later it is announced that the bus to Worcester has broken down and no other will be going there until the next day.

Back at the house, Johan helps Zosia with the preparations for their first Christmas dinner together. For the first time in years he is excited about the festive season. Overseas there was nobody really to share the occasion with before they met, and he never felt like coming back home to his mother’s overbearing presence and suffocating piety. He’d left on a job contract the moment an opportunity arose. Meeting Zosia on one of his business trips to Berlin where she was working at the time was like discovering a new continent.

All day long Johan has been watching her rituals for the festivities, which felt refreshingly like a safety net and not a wet bag. He has been delegated to set up the Christmas tree and get fresh Cape salmon from town. Zosia insisted on a local fish and recipe for tonight. He happily obliged.

While she is busy with the last touches on the dinner, Johan goes into the dining room to admire the decorations on the table and choose a wine to go with the Cape salmon. They both look up at the sound of the door bell.

‘Who could…?’ Johan strides over to the intercom, followed by Zosia, wiping both hands on her apron.

‘Beggars?’ she asks.

‘No, it’s Sanna!’ Johan buzzes the gate open for their housekeeper. Flustered, she explains about the bus. While Johan considers other options for getting Sanna safe home for Christmas, Zosia comes up with a simple solution.

‘You must stay with us for dinner, Sanna. Please, we would love to have you. And first thing tomorrow morning, we can both take you to your family in Worcester.’

‘But…’ Sanna is at a loss for words.

‘No buts, please, come. You can tell me how the salmon turned out. And for once, the extra plate at the Christmas table won’t remain empty.’ She smiles reassuringly and ushers Sanna through to the dining room, taking her luggage from her.

A while later Zosia is busy dishing out the food in the kitchen and Johan opens a bottle of wine. Sanna sits alone at the decorated Christmas table and does not know what to do with her fidgeting hands. With the left one she raises her fork, turns it, and watches the candlelight reflect off its polished tines. She puts it down again. Then with her right hand she picks up the spoon and inspects her image in its concave surface. Upside down, her head looks small, her torso elongated. She likes the slimmer version of herself. She turns the spoon and sees her still distorted face, but now the right way up, staring back. Her mouth is bigger than all her other features. She twitches her lips, opens them slightly and smiles. Slowly, from ear to ear.

‘Dinner is served,’ Zosia enters with the salmon from the kitchen.

First published as “’N SILWER LEPEL” in By on 20 December 2008.

Book mark: The Night Watchman by Richard Zimler

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The Night WatchmanChief Inspector Henrique Monroe of the Lisbon Police Department is brilliant at what he does, but gets help from a very unusual source. When a successful businessman is murdered under strange circumstances in his home, Monroe is called to investigate. The complex case awakens memories of Monroe’s distant past of growing up in Colorado with his younger brother Ernie, and threatens to unravel the fragile new reality the cop had been constructing around himself in Portugal ever since. His search for truth takes him to the country’s highest echelons of power. What he finds is horrifying, but tragically common. The Night Watchman portrays a troubled, corrupt society any South African reader will recognise. Tense, deeply felt, the novel asks a pivotal question: “Was it a paradox that truths left unspoken ended up taking away your voice?” The disquieting answers it provides are heart-breaking.

The Night Watchman
by Richard Zimler
Corsair, 2014

Book mark first published in the Cape Times on 12 December 2014.

In 2007, I reviewed one other novel by Richard Zimler:

The Seventh GateThe Seventh Gate
Constable, 2007

In 1990 the discovery of seven manuscripts of the sixteenth-century Kabbalist Berekiah Zarco sparked Richard Zimler’s internationally bestselling novel The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon (1996). Following its success, Zimler, an American living in Portugal, published two other novels about the Portuguese-Jewish Zarco family: Hunting Midnight (2003) and Guardian of the Dawn (2005).

The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon explores the fates of the Jewish community at the time of the Lisbon massacre of April 1506. Partly set in nineteenth-century Africa, Hunting Midnight is the story of a friendship between the Portuguese John Zarco Stewart and an African healer and freed slave named Midnight. Guardian of the Dawn takes us back to Goa at the time of the Catholic Inquisition in the seventeenth century.

The fourth novel in Zimler’s independent historical novels series is The Seventh Gate. Set in Berlin of the 1930s, it portrays Hitler’s brutal rise to power and the effects it had on the Jewish community and the disabled long before Second World War began. It subtly exposes how a whole nation could succumb to the madness of the Nazi regime; some willingly, others under extreme pressure. Meticulously researched and vividly brought to life, Zimler’s Berlin of the 1930s is a nightmarish place where loyalty between family members and friends as well as each individual’s sanity and heroism are tested to the limits.

In spite of its harrowing topic, The Seventh Gate is the kind of novel that makes you relax after the first twenty pages, knowing that there is another five hundred in store for you before the final curtain falls. Driven by superbly drawn characters, strong dialogues, and the unusual but beautifully touching love story at its centre, The Seventh Gate is a tribute to all the people who suffered similar fates at the hand of the Nazis as the characters in the novel.

The story is told by Sophie. In the Preface of the novel she is a fragile eighty-nine year old living in America and being taken care of by her nephew. After a spell in the hospital she decides to entrust him with her memories of the past when she was a teenage German girl in Berlin of the 30s and the world began to fall to pieces.

Sophie tells the story of Isaac Zarco, a descendant of the Kabbalist Berekiah Zarco, and the members of The Ring, now a clandestine group of Jewish activists trying to fight the Nazi regime. It is also the story of her brother Hansi, a distant child whom Sophie loves dearly and whose life is threatened by the Nazis. Misunderstood by her mother, betrayed by her father and Tonio, the boy she has a crush on, Sophie has to make some tough choices, trying to protect Hansi and her friends from the Nazi onslaught. The sudden wave of mysterious murders, disappearances and forced sterilizations makes her and Isaac realise that Berekiah Zarco’s worst fears might be about to come true, centuries after he wrote his manuscripts.

Artistically talented and mischievous, Sophie is a heroine one will not easily forget. Her passion for the cinema, her growing sense of righteousness, her awakening sexuality, and her selfless devotion to the people she loves sparkle with authenticity. The novel is interspersed with the poignant sketches she draws of her friends, adding to this overall effect.

Much has been written on Hitler’s Germany, but Zimler’s The Seventh Gate reveals a side of its inhumane machinery which has not been as prominent in the renderings of the time as it should have been, as the novel carefully examines how the horrors we associate with the time of the war already started happening in the early 30s with everyone watching almost in complete silence. Zimler probes the questions of how power is consolidated by intimidation and propagandistic lies, but also shows how small acts of courage and integrity can stand in its way. As Sophie comments on her younger self: “I’m still too young to know that people need only be frightened for their lives to swear that night is day. And that they can believe it’s really true.”

In an interview with Boyd Tonkin, Zimler stated that the relationship between the siblings Hansi and Sophie is his “monument” to the victims of the Nazi war on the disabled. The author expressed his wish that “every reader who reads the book with an open heart will be devastated by what happens to them both.” Because of the powerful storytelling of The Seventh Gate one cannot help but be.

Review first published in the Sunday Independent on 25 November 2007.