Search results for ""Jacana Media""
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd My Father, My Monster
Police spokesperson and former TV journalist McIntosh Polela has been on our screens for many years. But behind his seemingly unfazed demeanour, a troubled past haunts him. His parents disappeared when he was a little boy, leaving him and his sister Zinhle to suffer years of brutal abuse. When the truth of his parents’ disappearance is revealed, the teenage McIntosh makes a fully functioning gun from found object which he keeps for the day when he finds his father. He knows that he must come face to face with the man who robbed him of his childhood. McIntosh has to confront his father about his mother’s brutal death. How can he possibly forgive, when his father remains a remorseless brutal and heartless monster?
£19.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Beautyful Ones Have Just Been Born: Vol. IV: The Gerald Kraak Anthology
The Jacana Literary Foundation and the Other Foundation are thrilled to announce the publication of the fourth volume of The Gerald Kraak Anthology, The Beautyful Ones Have Just Been Born. With the prize ceremony linked to Africa Day, the publication of the anthology is tied to the Pride Month of June and the celebrations of the LGBTQI+ community which occur across the globe. This year’s anthology is filled with inspiring and fearless literary works of fiction, non-fiction and poetry from across Africa. These stories capture the essence of the African LGBTQI+ community and showcase some of Africa’s most talented writers. The anthology gives a voice to those who would otherwise be marginalised and it insists that differences must be recognised, embraced and celebrated. The second of the Gerald Kraak Anthologies, As You Like It, received the LAMBDA Literary Award for LGBTQ Anthology Fiction 2019 at a ceremony in New York. A testament to the brave storytellers of Africa, and the impact they have. The Gerald Kraak Anthology and Prize is made possible by the Jacana Literary Foundation and the Other Foundation.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Young Entrepreneur’s Playbook: Using Failure as a Shortcut to Success
The Young Entrepreneur’s Playbook is a sequential guide that takes the entrepreneur from inception of an idea to success and all the way to exit. Lindile details the milestones of growing and evolving a business in a journey that is by no means linear. This playbook reveals a path to the desired destination of every entrepreneur who uses it, where the entrepreneur can define his or her own formula of success, from the very first inkling of an idea and turning that into a reality. Lindile push-starts the entrepreneur using a strategy he calls Rapid Deployment to monetise ideas by turning them into reality. It is a model that can move an idea from zero to a hundred in a matter of days. Fast implementation allows the idea to go through an entire life cycle in a short space of time. Most importantly, it forces the budding entrepreneur to start. This playbook outlines the importance of investing in oneself. A successful exit is determined at the point of entry. The entrepreneur must take full control of how the journey ends or evolves. This guides the decisions that the entrepreneur makes as he or she starts and grows the business. Ultimately, entrepreneurship requires consistency, resilience, adaptability, mental strength and acute awareness. All of this must be rooted in mindfulness. Although mindfulness is not something taught in business schools, it is an essential element of success. At its very core, The Young Entrepreneur’s Playbook is for anyone with an idea to bring to life, something of value to provide, challenge to move past, aspiration to chase after and willingness to do something about it. This is a playbook of how to get it done, all the while embracing failure as an important part of the process but ultimately a useful tool to expedite the very outcome that you seek.
£12.99
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd 10 Inspiring Singers, Writers & Artists (English)
Imbokodo: Women Who Shape Us is a groundbreaking series of books which introduces you to the powerful stories of South African women who have all made their mark and cleared a path for women and girls. These books recognise, acknowledge and honour our heroines and elders from the past and the present. South African women are silent no more on the roles that we have played in advancing our lives as artists, storytellers, writers, politicians and educationists. The title ‘Imbokodo’ was been chosen as it is a Zulu word that means “rock” and is often used in the saying ‘Wathint’ Abafazi, Wathint’ Imbokodo!’, which means “You Strike a Women, You Strike a Rock!” These books were made possible with the support of Biblionef and funding from the National Arts Council. In 10 Curious Inventors, Healers & Creators you will read about the women who shape our world through education, science and maths. You will read about women who became teachers, nurses, social workers, scientists and community workers, overcame obstacles and through their work fought for social change.
£8.68
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Discovery of Love
The Discovery of Love, explores and heightens one of the dominant themes in Nthikeng Mohlele’s literary oeuvre, that of love. In this collection, love is reflected upon in expansive and unexpected dimensions. It becomes the backdrop against which Mohlele delves into the intricacies of human agency with profound and often unexpected effects. These stories dazzle; they are wide-ranging in scope, yet particular in their authorial intent.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Anthology: Vol. X
Now in its 10th year, the Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award is a launching pad for upcoming poets. From slam poetry to formal rhyme, the anthology is a celebration of language and cultural diversity. Assembled by a brilliant team of judges, from a blind selection, this year’s compilation contains the best poems from over 600 entries, in 10 of the 11 South African languages. Named after Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje (1876–1932), the award recognises the life and vision of this highly respected political and social activist. We always hope that it reveals the political and social attitudes of our time and reflects the complex, nuanced and uncomfortable truths of life in South Africa.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The White People
The vast crowd that line the beflagged route to the Kremlin was, as in New York, friendly and cheering. ‘Welcome, Otherworld Visitors to the Land of Socialism!’ spelt out the banners, in big Cyrillic letters. ‘For Universal Peace and Free Scientific Exchanges!’ The chairman of the Supreme Soviet, Noriskin, followed closely along the pattern set by Dr Faradien when he introduced Rogard. And Rogard’s message of peace and goodwill, expressed in flawless Russian, once again met with loud and enthusiastic applause. The White People came from the planet Oxindu. They were highly intelligent and they came in peace. Or did they? This astonishing novel has been buried in the archives for over fifty years. Written by Michael Harmel in 1959, The White People deftly and presciently maps the state of the Earth in the middle of the Cold War, mirroring the struggles around the world for a common language, humanity and a way of lessening the environmental destruction of the planet.
£14.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Black Consciousness Reader
The fact is that the role, relevance and contribution of the Black Consciousness philosophy is more warranted now than ever. See, Black Consciousness does not die. It remains relevant even when it is apparently dormant. Its approach and method are always readily available to be used by the oppressed when the need arises to confront particular and universal challenges posed by institutional racism and violence. Black Consciousness has turned up the heat against oppressive rule, exploitation and racism in South Africa and around the world, as young people and politicians, academics and campaigners reconfigure a global socioeconomic revolution. Long linked with universal freedom movements, Black Consciousness has a particularly profound and proud history in the country that gave birth to Steve Biko. An intrinsic part of international solidarity actions, it still captures the imagination of resistance fighters young and old. Embracing African liberation, the Black Panthers, Black Power in England, Marxism in the Caribbean and remarkable links even to Mao Tse-tung’s Cultural Revolution, it remains at the centre of struggles for people’s power. First published in 2017, the year of the 40th anniversary of Biko’s murder by the apartheid regime, The Black Consciousness Reader has been revised and updated as an essential collection of history, interviews and opinions about the philosophy. A contribution to the world’s Black cultural archive, it examines how the proper acknowledgement of Blackness brings a greater love, a broader sweep of heroes and a wider understanding of intellectual and political influences. Although Biko is a strong figure within this history, the book documents many other significant Black Consciousness personalities and actions, as it predominantly focuses a South African eye on its influence on power, feminism, land, art, music, society and religion. Keorapetse ‘bra Willie’ Kgositsile and his son, American rap prodigy Earl Sweatshirt are inside it. So too Onkgopotse Tiro, Vuyelwa Mashalaba, a young Nomzamo Winnie Mandela, Bobby Seale, Assata Shakur, Neville Alexander, Thomas Sankara, Walter Rodney, Lefifi Tladi, Ready D, Ntsiki Biko, Nina Simone, Barney Pityana, Zulaikha Patel and many others. It looks at links between K-Pop and Black Consciousness, militancy in Harlem and the uprisings in Soweto, Black theology and the bible’s red commandments. This amalgam of facts, ideas, images and moving pictures is written and compiled by political journalist Baldwin Ndaba, culture writers Therese Owen and Masego Panyane, columnist and poet Rabbie Serumula, author and political analyst Janet Smith and multimedia specialist and church leader Paballo Thekiso.
£20.00
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Saving a Stranger’s Life: The Diary of an Emergency
Anne Biccard has worked as an emergency doctor in Johannesburg for more than 30 years. It is a job that is both terrifying and thrilling, where death can be outwitted by skill and quick thinking, and the pressure eased by dark humour. The coronavirus, however, has added another dimension of fear. In this heartwarming and at times hilarious memoir she recounts some of the cases that have burst in through her doors, such as the woman who mistook her Dettol for beer and the man who tried to run down his cardiologist. There is sadness, too, as she remembers the patients who didn’t make it. Above all, she writes of the camaraderie and dogged determination of health workers holding fast in the face of the Covid-19 nightmare as they battle, every day, to save a stranger’s life.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Those Who Live in Cages: A Novel
This novel opens the door to the lives of five Coloured women facing life-changing challenges while trying to do the most important thing – survive another day in Eldorado Park in the south of Johannesburg. Kaylynn, Bertha, Janice, Laverne and Raquel try to navigate their way through domestic violence, migration, coming of age and the ever-cloying patriarchy that permeate every part of living in Eldorado Park, affectionately known as Eldos by its people. These women are at different ages and stages of their lives yet connected by this one place and a community that has shaped their worldview. Through phone calls, diary entries, poems and other forms of reported speech, each woman’s struggles are told with honesty. Written, in part, from the perspective of Eldos, this predominantly Coloured township comes alive as the reader gets a look into the heart of a community that has been branded with the image of addiction and violence. The author’s hope is to take the reader on a sensory experience that lays bare the sights, smells and soul of Eldos through the eyes of its residents and specifically these women characters. At its core, Those Who Live In Cages is a story about Coloured women, family, friendship, identity, and the many ways one can play the hand that life deals you.
£11.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Predator Politics: Mabuza, Fred Daniel and the Great Land Scam
Corruption cost taxpayers around R1.5 trillion during Jacob Zuma’s spell as president of South Africa. Despite attempts by the police, the courts and the Public Protector to stem the rising tide of graft in South Africa, several politicians were rewarded with high office after stealing the aspirations of millions of people. Fred Daniel, one citizen among many targeted by predator politicians, stood up against the scourge. The retaliation he faced after attempts by corrupt politicians to grab his nature reserve in Mpumalanga included vandalism, arson, smears and death threats. His nemesis is Deputy President D.D. Mabuza, who presided over several departments in the province that were wrecked by graft before he ascended to the position of the second most powerful politician in the country. Fred has won more than twenty cases over the past fifteen years in magistrates’ and high courts where his claims of corruption-related harassment were found credible. The North Gauteng High Court is hearing his damages claim against Mabuza, government departments and officials amounting to more than R1 billion. It stems from Fred’s exposure of fraudulent land scams allegedly orchestrated by Mabuza. At great personal cost, Fred and his family stood up to corruption. They endured the loss of a livelihood and their home – and the fear that follows when the government places a target on the back of a citizen blowing the whistle on its misdeeds. Fred will not back down. For him, failure is not an option.
£18.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Joburg Noir
‘This place is labelled the city of gold, Jozi Maboneng. There is indeed a constant rush, the winner takes it all, and a “survival of the fittest” mentality driving the hunger and competitive spirit of those born here, and equally seen in the eyes of the immigrants; legal and illegal alike. Dreams not realised have left most of the once-eager hopefuls desolate, seeking shelter under bridges and abandoned city buildings… Oh Yeoville, Yeoville man, now this was a whole different world on its own … the culture, the music, the DJs and live bands, the food and the hangout places’ – Gloria Bosman, ‘A Little Something from the Pot’ Joburg Noir is a collection of writings about memories, legends, loss, jokes, stories, myths and experiences by twenty-two gifted and versatile authors in South Africa. It makes the reader experience present-day Johannesburg as if one were in the past. The stories seek to understand, reconstruct, reinvent and recover this city space of loss, joy, deprivation, resistance and possibility by revealing its complex dynamics. They are funny, shocking, violent, absurd, strangely tender and memorable. Their lasting resonance lies in the fact that they invoke the joys and traumas of the past and present, making the two to co-exist and interlock. After reading this uncompromising and gritty anthology, the reader is bound to feel like a time-traveller who has voyaged into a magical alternate city and a reality that was either misnamed or not named at all. The intention is to help the readers to delve into their own memories in search of pictures of their sweet childhood and fractured identities.
£18.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Fourth Domestic Revolution: Madam and Eve 2019 Annual
What’s an end of the year celebration without Madam & Eve? They go together like a crazy marriage, like the ANC without a split, like the EFF and red overalls, like Auntie Helen and Twitter, like bread and butter and jam, like the cream on the top. They’re funny, familiar and wonderful, like Marmite to your mates overseas, like recognisable and special, like no Christmas stocking should be without one. The Madam & Eve annual is a very special part of our heritage, loved by the young, loved by the old, it’s the present that always gets sold! It’s the perfect gift for the whole family.
£11.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The 30-Year Safari: A Celebration of Getaway Photography
Exhibiting the wonders of nature and the beauties of the African continent, The 30-Year Safari: A celebration of Getaway photography is an awe-inspiring coffee table book showcasing photography from the last decade to celebrate Getaway’s 30th birthday. Having built a loyal and dedicated readership, Getaway designed this book using photographs from its own readers. It is a salute to all Africa has to offer – from its natural splendour to the talent of its contributors. Images from the sea to the sky grace the pages in the form of high-definition photos, and with its elegant hardcover format and dust jacket, it is the perfect travel inspiration book. Getaway has become synonymous with the finest African travel photography and this book – the very best of its archive – is a tribute to the many photographers who have made it so. It is indeed a book made by Getaway readers for Getaway readers.
£21.00
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Wanda
Ontmoet vir Wanda, met haar pragtige bos hare. Sy is dapper en sterk, maar sy is ongelukkig omdat die seuns by die skool haar genadeloos terg. Deur Makhulu se haargeheime en stories leer sy egter om haar hare as ’n kroon te sien, en iets waarop sy trots kan wees. Hierdie boek gaan oor identiteit en skoonheid, en is ’n viering van hoe kultuurtrots deur generasies heen geleer en oorgedra word.
£9.34
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Recipes
Famous for her hilarious do-it-yourself videos, SuzelleDIY has released her very own cookbook, Recipes. Also available in Afrikaans, the pages are full of delicious recipes that Suzelle has gathered and created over the years, from her ouma’s old classics to her own creative ideas that will get everyone talking at their next dinner party!Recipes by SuzelleDIY is a passion project put together by Suzelle and her team. This project has been a long time in the making and the Sketchbook team cannot wait to finally share the book with the world!Readers will be tantalised with scrumptious desserts, easy dinners, fun and delicious twists on South African favourites (bobotie balls anyone?), as well as a few wonderful recipes from special guests who also wanted their recipes in the book, shame.This cookbook is for everybody! So pop on your aprons people! It’s time to use your own creativity and make some delicious kitchen magic happen. DIY? Because anybody can!
£18.99
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Rusty Bell: A novel
“I wrestled with life and lost.” So begins the story of Michael, a corporate lawyer known to his colleagues and associates as Sir Marvin, who picks his way – sometimes delicately, but more often in his own blundering way – through the unfathomable intricacies that make up a life: love and anger, humility and ambition, trust and distrust, selfishness and selflessness. A flawed individual with an acute understanding of the roads that must be navigated to achieve even the slightest insight into the human condition. In this study in introspection, embroidered with lyrical prose and astonishing intuition, the hero, meditative and melancholic, is at once both tragic and comic.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd I am Liza Smit: The aftermath of murder
On 22 November 1977, 40 years ago, Robert Smit and his wife Jean were brutally murdered in their Springs home. They were shot and stabbed several times. The words RAU TEM were spray-painted in red on the walls. A high-ranking member of the National Party, Robert Smit was involved in probable sanctions-busting activities through a front company, Santam International. Told by Liza Smit, daughter of Robert and Jean, who was 13 years old at the time of the murders, this is a book of two stories; the story of the life-long and destructive impact the murders had on the lives of those left behind, and particularly and very poignantly, on that of Liza’s own life.It also tries to unravel the mystery of the murders. We follow Liza as she gathers evidence to present to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and meets with a wide array of those who might help solve the crime, from ministers to shady con men. Despite Liza’s efforts and the huge public interest in the murders, despite the numerous conjectures on who might have murdered this high-ranking politician and his wife, despite the complicated reasons put forward as to who might have given the orders to have them killed, 40 years later we are no closer to a conviction or a trial. Told by the daughter of Robert and Jean Smit, I am Liza Smit lends an intimate insider’s view into apartheid intrigues not accounted for at the TRC.
£15.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Good capitalism, bad capitalism: The role of business in South Africa
South Africa has entered a new era, with the country’s recently elected president, Cyril Ramaphosa, promising a ‘new dawn’. But will President Ramaphosa and his administration, together with business and labour, be able to turn the economy around and at last satisfy the aspirations of millions of people who, for decades, have been promised better lives? And what role should business – and organised business – be playing in all of this? Although business is the main driver of the economy, it has for years been a passenger in economic policy-making. These and other questions relating to South Africa’s complex character and uncertain future prospects are thoroughly explored in Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism: The Role of Business in South Africa.Written by prominent economist, Raymond Parsons, together with Ali Parry, the book offers a balanced and absorbing analysis of what various institutions and individuals have (and have not) done to eradicate the legacy of apartheid and bring South Africa to where it is today. Freed from the shackles of the Zuma regime, South Africa now has a decisive opportunity to take stock of what has gone wrong in the country since the advent of democracy and take appropriate corrective action. But will it? What are the chances of success?History can so easily repeat itself if politicians and business leaders choose to ignore the lessons of the past. Fresh thinking and a large dose of pragmatism are imperative if South Africa is to turn the corner and build a bigger, stronger and better economy. At this critical juncture, organised business institutions in South Africa also need to reprise their role as the voice and champion of the constituencies they are mandated to serve.
£16.99
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Hasta la Gupta, baby!
No little thorn in the flesh or irritating fly in the ointment, Zapiro just cannot be ignored. It's been one helluva year. We've held our breath thinking Zuma may resign. We've seen Juju re-booted and Zille tweeted out. We've seen Trump's megalomania, Bell Pottinger's spin and Pravin's fightback, cadres captured and Cabinet's relocation to Saxonwold Shebeen. GuptaLeaks threaten to drown us and as the flood rises the rodents scatter. And who better to make sense of this than Zapiro, political analyst, cartoonist and agent provocateur. He has the ability to knock the air out of us, to rock us back in our seats, to force us bolt upright with a 1000-watt jolt of electrifying shock. He shines a light on the elephant in the room, presents the emperor in all his naked glory. When all around is crumbling, when fake news and zipped lips conceal the truth, Zapiro comes to the rescue.
£11.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The Sol Plaatje European Union poetry anthology
The seventh volume in this series anthologises the best entries for the 2017 Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award. The anthology is a truly democratic as well as creative effort, in keeping with the spirit of the legendary intellectual giant, Sol Plaatje; activist, linguist, translator, novelist, journalist and leader. The poems offer readers sensibilities, observations and responses to the complex, nuanced and uncomfortable realities of life in our country – past, present and future. Written in Afrikaans, English, Sepedi, Sesotho, Setswana, isiXhosa and isiZulu and accompanied by English translations where relevant, they reflect the diversity of our nation. The poems are important. Chair of the judging panel, Professor Mongane Wally Serote, says: “These South African poets have understood something. They hold the present by the scruff and threaten it. If this nation has not revolted, it is evolving to revolt, the poets say. The present cannot hold, the poets keep saying. Like healers, they sing, beat the drums and dance to the rhythm of their tongues.” Each year the Jacana Literary Foundation (JLF) invites South African poets, young and old, debut or previously published, to submit for consideration up to three works in any of the official languages of South Africa. Athol Williams, Goodenough Mashigo, Wally Serote, Pieter Odendaal and Kholeka Putuma are on this year’s judging panel. Judging blind, they select a long-list of poems for publication in the anthology. The project is funded by the European Union.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd New times
Rehana Rossouw takes us into a world seemingly filled with promise yet bedeviled by shadows from the past. In this astonishing tour de force Rossouw illuminates the tensions inherent in these new times. Ali Adams is a political reporter in Parliament. As Nelson Mandela begins his second year as president, she discovers that his party is veering off the path to freedom and drafting a new economic policy that makes no provision for the poor. She follows the scent of corruption wafting into the new democracy's politics and uncovers a major scandal. She compiles stories that should be heard when the Truth Commission gets underway, reliving the recent brutal past. Aaliyah Adams lives with her devout Muslim family in Bo-Kaap. Her mother is buried in religion after losing her husband. Her best friend is getting married, piling up the pressure to get settled and pregnant. There is little tolerance for alternative lifestyles in the close-knit community. Ali/Aaliya is trapped with her family and friends in a tangle of razor-wire politics and culture, but can she break free? Told with Rehana's trademark verve and exquisite attention to language you will weep with Aaliya, triumph with Ali, and fall in love with the assemblage that makes up this ravishing new novel.
£14.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd A tree for the birds
In the the mysterious world of the Congo River, we meet Chrisnelt, a young Congolese boy who grows into manhood shaped by the vast leaves held in the branches of tropical forests, all the while battling a ravaged world of globalized greed and death. Chrisnelt is a gardener of unusual genius: he learns from birds, insects, and foreign weeds. Chrisnelt is guided by the ancient journey of water in his part of Africa: the constant flow to the ocean, and the rise back into the sky of mists. This powerful story at the edge of damnation bends a reflection of all of us through the eyes of a birdwatcher who sees wings fly like escaping leaves on streams of eternal water and air for all.
£16.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Selling LipService
Introduces readers to a strange assortment of new vocabulary, and through this touches on the familiar danger of the commercialization of language. Through a linguistically brilliant text, Tammy Baikie has created a world that exposes a society swallowed up by ad men.
£15.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd What a great idea!: Awesome South African inventions
Did you know that the machine used to drill tunnels for the first underground railway in England was invented by a South African, or that the first computers in South Africa were women calculators working at the Royal Observatory in Cape Town? Everyone knows that the Kreepy Krawly, Pratley's Putty, Dolos, and CATscanner were invented in South Africa, but what about the Sheffel Bogie, Oil of Olay, Q20, Policansky fishing reels, Lodox low-dose X-ray machine, and Waste Shark? This authoritative volume is crammed with information on the awesome variety of new products and services that South Africans, at home and abroad, have invented from precolonial times to the present. Written in a highly accessible style and richly illustrated, the book spotlights Wadley's Loop, Louis Liebenberg's Cybertracker, the unique Africanis dog, the first computerized ticketing system in the world, the first ever digital laser, and more. Historic photographs, fascinating anecdotes, and illuminating case studies light up the text and make it read like a detective novel.
£20.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The illustrated dictionary of Southern African plant names
This book, the first of its kind, compiled over six years, provides a wealth of information that opens up a new world of understanding for all plant lovers. For anyone with an interest in botany or wondering what a plant name means, this remarkable book will be an indispensable guide.
£25.16
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Darwin’s hunch: Science, race, and the search for human origins
Scientists, and their research, are often shaped by the prevailing social and political context at the time. Kuljian explores this trend in South Africa and provides fresh insight on the search for human origins – in the fields of palaeoanthropology and genetics – over the past century. The book follows the colonial practice in Europe, the US and South Africa of collecting human skeletons and cataloguing them into racial types, in the hope that they would provide clues to human evolution. Kuljian sheds light on how, during apartheid, the concept of racial classification mirrored the way in which many scientists thought about race and human evolution.
£17.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd What will people say: A novel
In What Will People Say?, a rich variety of township characters—the preachers, the teachers, the gangsters and the defeated—come to life in vivid language as they eke out their lives in the shadows of gray concrete blocks of flats. It is the story of the Fourie family, residents of Hanover Park in the Cape Flats during the height of the struggle era. Which members of the Fourie family will thrive, which ones will not survive? Generously spiced with Cape Flats slang, the novel features vivid and gritty descriptions of the difficult issues faced by those living in this marginalized and disadvantaged community.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The search for the rarest bird in the world
Part detective trail, part love affair and pure story telling at its best. In 1990 an expedition of Cambridge scientists arrived at the Plains of Nechisar, tucked between the hills of the Great Rift Valley in the Gamo Gofa province in the country of Ethiopia. On that expedition they collected twenty three species of small mammals, a rodent, a bat; three hundred and fifteen species of birds were seen, sixty nine species of butterfly were identified; twenty species of dragonflies and damselflies; seventeen reptile species were recorded; three frog species were filed; plants were listed. And the wing of a bird was packed into a brown paper bag. It was to become the most famous wing in the world. When the specimens finally arrived at the British Natural History Museum in Tring it set the world of science aflutter. It seemed that the wing was unique, but they questioned, can you name a species for the first time based only on the description of a wing, based on just one wing? After much to and fro confirmation was unanimous, and the new species was announced, Nechisar Nightjar, Caprimulgus solala, (solus:only and ala:wing). And birdwatchers like Vernon began to dream. Twenty two years later an expedition of four led by Ian Sinclair set off to try to find this rarest bird in the world. Vernon R.L. Head captivates and enchants as he tells of the adventures of Ian, Dennis, Gerry and himself as they navigate the wilderness of the plains, searching by spotlight for the elusive Nechisar Nightjar. But this book is more than a boy's own adventure in search of the rarest bird in the world. It is a meditation on nature, on ways of seeing, on the naming of things and why we feel so compelled to label. It is a story of friendships and camaraderie. But most of all it embraces and enfolds one into the curious and eye-opening world of the birdwatcher. For birdwatchers, twitchers, bird lovers, and about-to-become birdwatchers everywhere. For those who enjoy the natural world, the outdoors, the untamed places. Reminiscent of Nathaniel's Nutmeg and Longitude, this true story of incredible adventure will bring out the explorer in everyone who reads it.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Sunderland
Unhappily married Cape Town academic Art Berger is offered what appears to be a professional lifeline: to reconstitute the final papers of the great South African writer Charles de Villiers into book form. He is uncomfortable about the role of ghostwriter, but the project becomes literary detective work he cannot give up. Introduce de Villiers' beautiful daughter, Lynda, and Art is ensnared. Sunderland alternates between sections, mostly in journal form, chronicling Art's struggle to make sense of de Villiers' fragmented and disordered text, and sections—scenes, notes, outlines—from that very work. A novel of literary ideas as much as of character, this fascinating collaboration by two of South Africa's finest wranglers of words comes to a literal crescendo. It is a finely tuned masterpiece to read in one sitting.
£11.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd My mzansi heart
In this memoir—or as the author describes it, ""nonfiction novel""—the reader is swept along two equally entertaining narrative strands, one set in the present day, the other in the past. Mashed together, they form the story of King Adz's life—the man also known as ""Adam Stone"" to the authorities. The book describes, in the present day, Adz's quest to make some sense of modern South Africa. He spends as much time as he can hanging out with a selection of interesting, unusual, and creative locals, from Jack Parow to Roger Ballen. He also visits the most interesting places—Portuguese restaurants that are well past their sell-by dates, street culture festivals, and small dorps that are off the map. Through all this is the palpable sense that when Adz is in South Africa, he always feels at home. The backbone of the book tells how Adz came to South Africa, with wife and children, and worked in the world of brands, advertising, and digital media. Readers learn how he accidentally became a film director and might also have fallen into bad company. This is a fascinating, funny chance to look at South Africa through the eyes of an outsider who has forced himself inside.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Another country: South Africa’s new portraits
Another country, South Africa: New portraits is based on South Africans' views on the country and personal history; it gives an unvarnished account of what has changed personally and generally in the country through the lens of existing photographs. A follow-up to Reiner Leist's South Africa: Blue portraits, which was published in 1993 on the eve of the first democratic elections, Another country includes black and white portraits which are followed by new colour portraits of the participants, but also of surviving sons or daughters, a grandson, a new bearer of the office or the same site. The images are accompanied by edited versions of the conversations, which provide visual and verbal stories of humanity and the South African landscape.
£26.06
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The new radicals: A generational memoir of the 1970s
By the end of the 1960s, opposition to apartheid was in disarray. Yet in the space of a few short years. major and radical challenges developed that would set the country on a new path. This lively and original book tells the story of a generation of activists who embraced new forms of opposition politics that would have profound consequences. In the process it rescues the early 1970s from previous neglect and shows just how crucial these years were in the struggle to transform society. It explores the influence of Black Consciousness, the new trade unionism, radicalisation of students on both black and white campuses, the Durban strikes, and Soweto 1976, and concludes that these developments were largely the result of home-grown initiatives, with little influence exercised by the banned and exiled movements for national liberation.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Walk
The true and epic story of a boy's survival in the face of impossible odds. Walk tells the story of a deadly scramble down the wild coastline of what would become present-day South Africa and should be required reading for anyone interested in the early history of this complex nation and impeccably crafted literary fiction alike. This length of coastline is a hike that every South African should have the privilege of taking. But for the survivors of the wreck of the Grosvenor as they clambered onto the rocks on 5 August 1782, they might as well have crash-landed on Mars. The shipwrecked decided to walk to the Cape of Good Hope, though their ordeal starting at Lambasi in northern Pondoland ended in the dune deserts not far from what we now know as Port Elizabeth - for those few who survived it. Walk takes the reader, step by step, day by day, on William Hubberly's horrific trek. While indisputably fiction, Walk sails a good deal closer to the historical truth than most nonfiction you will read and is a haunting parable on the meeting of Europe and Africa.
£14.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd White paper, white ink
The ultimate page-turner. Imagine a crash course in South African history presented as a page turning, Shawshank Redemption-like, jail house-rock prison thriller. Imagine a book, the Pure white book, written in closely guarded code, to all extents invisible, because it is written with white ink on pure white pages. A book that no one can see or hold in their hands, which has been passed down orally by gangs in South African prisons, from generation to generation. Welcome to Picketberg Prison and to the historic moment in time when the gang-lord keepers of the code, for their own reasons, decide to publish the entire Pure white book. Two prisoners, neither of them gangsters, find themselves drawn into this project as ghost-writers. They are Sipho Madini - a street kid and gifted writer and poet - wrongfully imprisoned for burglary. And Don February, in his late sixties, who grew up in District 6 as a young gangster but who has since distanced himself from a gangster identity. Don, who did time on Robben Island in the 1970s, when it was still called "the University", has made it his mission to transform this backwater prison into a place of higher learning. Even the gangsters begin to show interest in Don's weekly discussion groups which deal with the themes of colonisation, dispossession and slavery. Through this process they begin to interrogate their own gang histories, inscribed on their bodies in the form of tattoos, and their own stories begin to unfold and weave in ways they never could have predicted. This is the story of two men's efforts not only to survive harsh prison conditions but to bring mental freedom and higher consciousness to the other inmates, challenging them to ask what the difference is between a freedom fighter and a common criminal.
£15.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd A kind of magic: The political marketing of the ANC
Providing a completely new and fresh way of understanding the ANC by looking at the way the organization has marketed itself and built up a distinctive brand, this book explores the development of the its political marketing strategy from 1955 to 2011. The concern is not so much with politics as with publicity, promotion, and propaganda—that is, with the techniques of political persuasion. The author argues that marketing has enjoyed a central significance within the ANC for a long time, and provides important insights into the strategy and decision-making process of the organization at critical phases of its existence, right up to the election campaign of 2009 and the Mangaung conference. The book rethinks the politics of the ANC and the future of its position at the center of South African political life.
£16.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Ystervarkrivier: A slice of life
A delightful collection of humorous stories, this book is set in the mythical village of Ystervarkrivier—ystervark means ""porcupine"" in Afrikaans—a forgotten outpost of the Drakeniqua Municipality, somewhere in South Africa. The central motif is the nine-hole golf course built by a displaced Yorkshireman, Harry Corkaby. The stories detail Harry’s attempts to understand South Africa in the postapartheid years and to make money for his retirement by encouraging people to play on his folly. The action is contemporary, reflecting recent events such as Tiger’s divorce, the 2010 soccer World Cup, and South African politics, but the setting is timeless: a pastoral South Africa with little racial tension. The rural setting allows incursions by such oddities as a one-eyed ostrich, a Sangoma by the name of Dr. Mamba, and the eponymous porcupine.
£10.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Ek weet dit!
Kom saam met Noenie, die Ngunikalfie, toe hy sy maatjie, die jongste Vee-reier, na die biblioteek neem. Toe Noenie hom aan die opwindende wereld van lees en boeke bekend stel, ontdek Vee-reier dat leer veel meer behels as net om te skree "Ek weet dit!" 'n Boek wat waarlik 'n liefde vir lees vier en aanmoedig.
£7.56
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Rumours
Keke, a veteran MK cadre who was once the CEO of a mobile phone company, wakes up one day to find his life in ruins. He has lost his job and his wife, and he has become more and more reliant on the solace of alcohol. After hitting rock bottom, Keke is thrust into a spiritual journey. He meets Ami, a shaman from Mali, and travels there, where he is “cooked” and cleansed in a “meeting” with his ancestors. Only when he is healed and understands his role in the context of a postapartheid South Africa, can Keke make a careful comeback to his country to rejoin his wife and comrades. The global village, the African continent, and South Africa are the platforms where Keke’s life unfolds in the 21st century.
£14.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Inkosana eyOnwabileyo
Oscar Wilde's timeless, compassionate tale of the friendship between the Happy Prince and the Swallow is brought to life by Joan Rankin's sensitive, magical artwork. Beloved since it was first published in 1888, this enchanting story will be enjoyed by both adults and children. From his high pedestal, the Happy Prince, a magnificent golden statue, can see all the misery of the city below him. He begs a little Swallow to pluck off his treasure and share it amongst the poor. When the Happy Prince asks his new friend to stay and help him, the Swallow receives a lesson in kindness and caring.
£10.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Olami: Simple nourishing fresh
The Olami cookbook from Nirit Saban of the popular deli on Bree Street, Cape Town is all about simple, nourishing, wholesome food. Olami, a word used in Israel, means global, universal and worldly, and Nirit’s recipes open the door to many fusions and intermingling flavours from the Middle East to South America. A book that keeps in mind the local, the recipes with easy-to-source ingredients make it accessible to everyone. ‘There is something magical that happens at Olami every day, whether it be the flavours we combine, the music that streams through the sound of sizzling and steaming and bubbling, the voices of our customers and friends and family, the arrival and departure of our suppliers – the consistent flow of work and production all adds up to a melting pot of powerful elements that nourish the team and the customers in the most inspiring way. The intention behind Olami and my life is to be as connected to nature as nature is to us. We at Olami are incredibly humbled at this opportunity to share the food we love with everyone.’ – Nirit Saban In the book one will find classic recipes with a twist, the focus being on using original flavour bases with different combinations to create meals with flair and flavour. One can roast butternut with a glaze of honey and sprinkled toasted sesame seeds or one can mash the butternut and top it with loads of parsley, lemon, olive oil and a dusting of sweet paprika.
£20.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Sanctuary: How an Inner-city church spilled onto a sidewalk
A magisterial and masterful addition to the tradition of South African narrative non-fiction, Christa Kuljian's Sanctuary offers a welcome woman's voice in a genre distinguished by Jonny Steinberg, Antony Altbeker and Anton Harber. After years of sporadic media attention and posturing by politicians, Kuljian has made it her business to find out exactly what has been going on at the Central Methodist Church in downtown Johannesburg, where the Church acts as a gateway to the city - an Ellis Island for South Africa, the place where many migrants first go to get their bearings. How did a place of worship turn into a shelter for thousands of refugees? Where did they come from? Why are they still there? Seeking to answer such questions, Kuljian fluently combines many elements: interviews with members of the refugee community and residents of the Church, and key figures like Bishop Paul Verryn, who has often been at the centre of the storm; historical material on the church and its role in the city since the early years; and an understanding of urban dynamics, migrancy, and South African and southern African politics. The result is a complex, open-eyed book that grapples with some of South Africa's most urgent social problems as they are refracted through one appalling, frustrating, inspiring place.
£17.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd The book of war
The story of a boy who comes into manhood during war, this book follows an illiterate European child who is stranded on the southern tip of Africa. As the British and the Xhosa have been engaged in battle for 80 years, the young man signs up for the conflict in the hope of steady meals and a few shillings a month. His new commander, the Captain—hardly more than a boy himself—commands an assortment of convicts, sailors, and drunkards culled from the port at the Cape of Good Hope. While the group travels through a landscape prowled by wild beasts, the distinction between man and animal becomes increasingly blurred. Based on firsthand accounts of the 8th Xhosa War, this book converts the bare facts into something terrible and strange.
£14.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Plague, pox and pandemics: A Jacana pocket history of epidemics in South Africa
Over the last decades, we have seen more than three dozen new infectious diseases appear, some of which could kill millions of people with one or two unlucky gene mutations or one or two unfavourable environmental changes. The risks of pandemics only increase as the human population grows; therefore to direct our future we should examine our past. Howard Phillips provides the first look into the history of epidemics in South Africa, probing lethal episodes which significantly shaped this society over three centuries. Focusing on devastating diseases such as smallpox, bubonic plague, Spanish influenza, polio and HIV/Aids, Plague, Pox and Pandemics probes their origin, their catastrophic course and their consequences in both the short and long term. Their impact ranges from the demographic to the political, the social, the economic, the spiritual, the psychological and the cultural. As each of these epidemics occurred at crucial moments in the country's history - early in European colonisation, in the midst of the mineral revolution, during the South African War and World War I, as industrialisation was getting under way, and within the eras of apartheid and post-apartheid - the book also examines how these processes affected and were affected by the five epidemics, thereby adding important dimensions to an understanding of each. To those who read this book, South African history will not look the same again.
£10.99
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Afropolis: City/Media/Art
Metropolises often evoke images of flashy high-rise buildings, permanent background noise, backed-up cars and people moving quickly in all directions in their masses. New York, Tokyo, London, Sao Paulo. But what about Cairo? Lagos? Nairobi, Kinshasa, Johannesburg? More than half of the world's population lives in cities. Countries of the South in particular are facing fast-paced globalisation, with the highest rates of urbanisation taking place in African cities. Beyond Western models of urban development, African cities are creating their own urban structures, topography and cultures. How do these structures work? How do the residents of these cities organise their daily lives? What discussions are taking place in Africa about the history and future of cities? And how are artists thinking about and representing urban life in Africa? Lavishly illustrated and meticulously researched, Afropolis is the product of an exhibition developed by the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum in Cologne, Germany. The book focuses on the Big Five of African cities: Cairo, Lagos, Nairobi, Kinshasa and Johannesburg, and brings together positions of artistic and cultural studies, as well as detailed histories and the specific dynamics of these African cities, in order to expand our understanding of the concept of urbanity and the phenomenon of the City from an African perspective. This is the first time the book is available in English.
£21.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Tanuki Ichiban
Rabid to impress girls at underground dinner parties, Port of Cape Town mud traffic control officers Geronimo Chanboon and Darius Coochoomber III strive to smuggle and cook every rare critter on the endangered species roster. Meanwhile, Corsicana Malva, nursing a crush on retired circus orangutan Lahnee-O, spearheads the campaign to have the great apes declared human. Lovesick and gun-crazy, travel agent Gool Eunus, on the other hand, plots to take down the pretender to the throne of the Saudi Caliphate. This comical masterpiece holds the answers to who the Tanuki Ichiban really is and offers a witty and provocative milieu where elements of dreams and reality intertwine.
£12.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Kid Moses
Kid Moses takes us on an intimate journey through the hustle and violence of the streets of Dar es Salaam where Moses scrapes out a meagre existence. He escapes to an up-country orphanage, and later the remote wilderness of Tanzania, before returning to the street he calls home. Despite the awful cruelty of his world, Kid Moses reveals the fundamental compassion that resides within most of us.
£13.95
Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd Worlds in one country
Worlds in one country is a compact, inclusive history of writing in South Africa from the nineteenth century to 1994 that crosses boundaries of language and colour, including prose, poetry and theatre. It is an accessible story rather than a theoretical analysis, relating the evolution of writing to the history of the country. Worlds in one country is punctuated with significant and often well-known quotes taken from novels, short stories, poems and plays as well as from statements by writers themselves. At the same time there is precise referencing to works cited, an extensive bibliography and comprehensive index. This story takes the reader from the colonial period and early white exploration, through references to black mythology and affirmations of black and then Afrikaner identity, to writing in the city before and after 1948, through the watersheds of Sharpeville in 1960, Soweto in 1976 and the troubles preceding 1994. Readers will gain an overview of South African writing, beyond the differences of language and colour of what has been a highly fragmented society.
£13.95