Alex Smith

If you are seeking beauty and light, prepare also for the dark—page 3, The Master’s Ruse

Above the barcode and ISBN 9781874915164 of Patricia Schonstein’s The Master’s Ruse is the unhelpful class word ‘Fiction’.

Now, bear with me, even if my descriptions appear at first disconnected, while I set in place various components critical to the structure of this tale…—page 4, The Master’s Ruse

Karina, among whose many talents is a serious one for writing fine literary criticism, has told me sternly and often that a good, professional reviewer should never assume, unless instructed by the author, that the author and the narrator or any character in a fiction are one or even similar; they are to be judged distinct and with objectivity. The second law in Reviewing101 with Karina is: a good reviewer should not use the space of a review to show off her opinions or skill; the review is about the book in question, not the word skills, prejudices, social habits, dietary preferences or philosophies of the reviewer. Unfortunately, I am about to fail Karina’s exam in Reviewing101.

This, together with the warring strength of the regime that still governs us, have had a tremendous impact on my psyche and writing.’—page 4 The Master’s Ruse

Last year, at a PEN meeting and luncheon, I sat one chair down from Patricia Schonstein. Everybody who has written a book in this country, whether it is published or unpublished, poetry or prose, in particular everyone who remains living here (does not, I mean, move overseas and become affiliated with a university there, but stays here at the far end of Africa, where there is less access) knows well what kind of struggles are involved in getting ‘out there’, even as far as on the shelves in the local bookshops; so to be published four times in many languages internationally is a major feat, one to be deeply respected. During the meal, I asked Patricia when her next novel was due out, and what she told me was both unnerving and inspiring. (more…)

My brother gave me this file in the late eighties when I was about fourteen. At around that time I was reading Orwell’s 1984. Together the file and book made quite an impression. I have no idea why, but I always felt I must keep this file, or perhaps the file decided to keep me, and so it has moved with me five times. Usually I’m not aware of the file; it’s brown, trim and recessive; it takes up an unassuming place wherever we are currently living, and lingers there. For Christmas I received a copy of McSweeney’s Vol.19: Old Facts, New Fiction, & a Novella by T.C.Boyle (my copy came from the beloved Book Lounge and they have an excellent McSweeney’s selection). Vol.19 comes in a green cigar box and includes all kinds of vintage leaflets, for example Air Raid Instructions by the Federal Civil Defense Administration, ‘Young Men of Seventeen!’ a Marine recruitment card, ‘Your Horoscope Tells You How You Can Help the Republican Party Win! –a pamphlet published by the Republican National Committee, and ‘Fallout Protection’ and ‘A Pocket Guide to The Middle East’, both issued by the US Department of Defense.

As I browsed through my green cigar box, all these pamphlets and booklets reminded me of my own brown file of leaflets. (more…)

In her email containing Note of Affection#18 (a real love note to the city of Cape Town), celebrated ceramic artist Clementina van der Walt writes: Ceramics is the discipline I have been trained in and which I love, so for me that is the language of expression. My work is a search for meaning, meaning of life, meaning about what it is to be alive on the planet. The light, colours, rhythms and particularly patterns of Africa have always been a huge inspiration…I am inspired particularly by West African textiles, the graphic symbols used in writing, as well as the urban and physical landscape here in South Africa. I work in a language which is symbolic and responsive to the senses – sight, touch. Objects are often imbued with a particular energy of the maker which may or may not resonate with a viewer, in a non-intellectual way. In a sensual way, these objects may evoke memories and the visual and tactile languages may awaken archetypal instincts. These could stimulate either positive or negative responses which would be related to personal and cultural experiences. On what it is like being an artist in Africa in 2009, Clementina says, it’s very exciting, very challenging, a privilege really.

Note of Affection # 18
Early Morning Sound of Boilers in the City
Written by Clementina van der Walt at 6.30am from a 10th floor loft apartment in the city centre of Cape Town.
(more…)

The Love Africa Carnival is an online celebration of Africa. This year the carnival has featured some glorious ‘Notes of Affection for Africa’ from writers in Ethiopia, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia and South Africa.

Great and hearty thanks to all those writers who participated in the the 2008 Love Africa Carnival by sending poems, essays, stories, photographs and memoir articles.

The Carnival is supported by the following generous authors who have donated signed copies of their books as book prizes for the carnival:

Michael Ambetchew, Gabeba Baderoon, André Brink,
Lauren Beukes, Richard De Nooy, Louis Greenberg,
Liesl Jobson, Sarah Lotz, Jo-anne Richards,
Henrietta Rose Innes, Ben Trovato , Helen Moffett

Last Monday, over litchis and Rooibos tea with Sven’s wonderful view of Kalk Bay, the Love Africa Carnival honorary panel consisting of Karina Magdalena Szczurek and Helen Moffett selected the “MOST LOVED LOVE NOTE OF 2008”. (more…)

1925

On Saturday the 12th of Banjaru Tumbindu I went to my farm after having ordered the people of Madagali to help me in the harvesting. On my return I gave them a horse.
In Madagali, Hamman Yaji

The Diary of Hamman Yaji: Chronicle of a West African Muslim Ruler
By Hamman Yaji, James H. Vaughan, Anthony Hamilton Millard Kirk-Greene
Contributor James H. Vaughan, Anthony Hamilton Millard Kirk-Greene
Published by Indiana University Press, 1995
ISBN 0253362067, 9780253362063

[Undated, written between 1930-1935]

Mr Asimang was one of the most learned English teachers I have every surveyed on the globe of this world and my English essays and speaking depend fully upon his teaching.
Presbyterian Boys’School in Abetifi,Boakye Yiadom

Two-volumes of notebooks and diaries titled by diarist Yidadom: ‘Autobiography: My Own Life.’ In Africa’sHidden Histories: Everyday Literacy and Making the Self
By Karin Barber
Published by Indiana University Press, 2006
ISBN 0253218438, 9780253218438

1955

I have to admit that, in the beginning, everybody used the same formalities with me as the administrator. My friends cousins, and peers were paying me far too much respect. (more…)

1871

Mr. Stanley is better. [26th November, 1871.—Sunday. Mr. Stanley has severe fever.] We started at sunset westwards, then northwards for seven hours, and at 4 A.M. reached Lohinga, at the mouth of the Lusizé.
In Lohinga, David Livingstone

1872

As it is Sunday we stay here at N’dari’s village, for we shall be in an uninhabited track to-morrow, beyond the Lofu. The headman cooked six messes for us and begged us to remain for more food, which we buy. He gave us a handsome present of flour and a fowl, for which I return him a present of a doti. Very heavy rain and high gusts of wind, which wet us all.
In N’dari’s Village, David Livingstone

THE LAST JOURNALS OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE, IN CENTRAL AFRICA, FROM 1865 TO HIS DEATH.
CONTINUED BY A NARRATIVE OF HIS LAST MOMENTS AND SUFFERINGS,
OBTAINED FROM HIS FAITHFUL SERVANTS CHUMA AND SUSI,
BY HORACE WALLER, F.R.G.S.,RECTOR OF TWYWELL, NORTHAMPTON.
IN TWO VOLUMES.—VOL. II. [1869–1873]WITH PORTRAIT, MAPS, AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

1942 [undated]

Thembani Shangase did not take not of the Lord’s laws and couldn’t care less. She didn’t like it at all when the Lord said that the people of The Thorn-Bush-that Ensnared should dress according to tradition. She said among other was on in favour of this heathen habit. The Lord laid down a rule that every person who was a member of the Nazarite Church should not buy anything from Msikatshani’s store.
She went straight off and bought things there.
Well, after a while she fell really ill and began to waste away.
/…/
I wanted to experience that extraordinary thing that had never happened before. Indeed on that very day I took hold of the cloth that was used for pryaing over those who were afflicted. I wanted to experience this extraordinary wondrous happening for myself. I really held on tight so that the spirit of the Lord would com.
Indeed it[Themani’s spirit] came forth and said: ‘Ha! I know that you wanted to hear me speak. You see me. I’m not sick neither am I a demon, neither have I fufnyane hysteria, and I haven’t got amandiki either.
It said, ‘I am Thembani Shangase; I’ve died because I was given up by the Lord. That very Johannes Shembe,’ she said, ‘Heaven is his. Me, he threw away, with the church dues I’d given.’ As she spoke she picked bits up from the ground, she said, ‘Here’s my church dues from the girl’s offering, here’s my support money, here’s my money for the [holy] mountain. You gave me up with all my offerings.’ And she got out and jumped up above the house and grabbed the grass thatching and began to eat it.
We grabbed hold of her and she said, ‘Let me eat grass and the seeds of trees because I broke his law, because I bought seed bread and ate it and didn’t care a bit about him. But today I am warning you that he is indeed the only Lord.’
Then she began to sing the song that says, ‘My sins are more numberous than the hairs on my head. Who will rid me of this heavy load?’

Congregation of Ideni the Nazarite center, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, Lazarus ‘Phela’* Maphumulo
* Phela short for Phelalasekhaya (House Cockroach)

Lazarus Maphumulo’s Notebook, Unpublished manuscript. Photocopy in Shembe manuscript collection MS380455, Archives, School of Oriental and African Studies, London. Orinigal in Ekuphakameni Archive, Inanda, Durban. Sourced from ‘Diary of Visions’ by Liz Gunner in Africa’s Hidden Histories:
Africa’s Hidden Histories: Everyday Literacy and Making the Self
By Karin Barber
Published by Indiana University Press, 2006
ISBN 0253218438, 9780253218438

2007

Aight people, so I’m discovering the Zimbabwean fashion house Mushe, which is the initiative of a worldly cultured Zimbabwean young woman. She calls it Afropean ..mm interesting here’s the following sentence on her webbie that may explain that term:

“Having African ancestry and living European culture” u got that rite none of us who live abroad can’t deny that Western influence in our behaviour, thoughts, and clothing.

I love the webbie, looove the line, in particular the maternity clothing, so cuteee, a lot of time when African women are preggers we tend 2 be so conservative which is great but a little bit of style can’t hurt either rite..

But Mushe is also a summer and winter collection, w/beautiful colors, clean lines, funky contrast of different fabrics.

Musa believes in reppin for Afrika in her style and in her choice of fabric which I found quite interesting, she believes in the Fair trade of empowring third world countires by using their main resources, it’s interesting to me because she makes a choice 2 comply w/that..

it’s her way of giving back..:)

every way counts people …every action counts

I think her line is really cool, I love it…

it’s good that it’s universal while keeping it’s African spice..u dig

Just 1 thing where are my African sistas..u should get in touch w/Teiko for example who represent for the beautiful African sistas w/curves…for exple….

Love the line, love the concept, would wear these pieces in a heartbeat…
U go girl, keep reppin for us in the Netherlands

Here’s her webbie:
http://www.musheworld.com/

Here’s her contact:
afrodivah@xs4all.nl

Djaa my Zimbabwean sistas are more fiyaa:)
Eyee Wayeee:)
In Senegal, Yaye Marie Ba

From blog: COSWEAFRICANWOMENAREDOIN&DOINITWELL

Love note #13 comes from Tunisia, where Senegalise author, Mariama Ndoye, now lives. Mariama Ndoye has written several novels and numerous short stories, articles and essays. She has a doctorate in French Arts from Dakar University and has also been curator of the Dakar Museum of African Arts, a researcher at the Institut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire and a language training consultant for the African Development Bank in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire. Among her stories is “En Route to the Twenty-First Century”, which was Part of the celebrated anthology Women Writing Africa. West Africa and the Sahel, published by The Feminist Press in 2005. Mariama’s novels include Sur Des Chemins Pavoisés (On Golden Paths,1997), the award-winning Soukey(1999) and Comme Du Bon Pain (Like Good Bread, 2001) published by Nouvelles Editions ivoiriennes, Abidjan. Simon Gikandi’s Encyclopedia of African Literature notes :

Mariama Ndoye deserves a special place not because she is the heir to any school or writer but rather because she has produced a consistent, rich, varied and versatile body of works composed of powerful novels and short stories…Mariama Ndoye is a strong advocate of feminism in Senegal and an outspoken supporter of the emancipation and liberation of African women.

Mariama Ndoye Answers Questions On Love, Writing and Senegal (more…)

1849

From Alexandria to Cairo. Leave on a boat towed by a small steamer carrying only its engine. Flat, dead banks of the Mahmudiveh: on the shore a few naked Arabs running, from time to time, a traveler trots by on horseback, swathed in white with his Turkish saddle. Passengers:… an English family, hideous; the mother looks like a sick old parrot (because of the green eyeshade attached to her bonnet) … At Atfeh you enter the Nile and take a larger boat.
First night on the Nile. State of contentment and of lyricism: I gesticulate, recite lines from Bouilhet, cannot bring myself to go to bed; I think of Cleopatra. (more…)

‘La La la laaa, I built a railroad…’ Over the weekend the dog of debt came to me like Marley’s ghost. The Dog of Debt’s face. It loomed from impenetrable darkness, but had a brilliant light about it, and stood out like a boiled lobster in a soup kitchen pot. From a distance it appeared angry and ferocious, barking, but as I came closer the dog of debt was singing with the voice of Al Jolson, even though it was chained up to post. ‘La la la laa, they told me I was building a dream…’ The hair was curiously stirred, by the effort of barking or singing or perhaps the South Easter; and, though the eyes were wide open, they were perfectly motionless. Those teeth, and its red colour, made it horrible; but its horror seemed to be in spite of the face and beyond its control, rather than a part of its own expression.
`Mercy!’ I said. ‘Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me?’
Again the spectre raised a song, and gnashed its teeth, and bristled its red fur. ‘Don’t you remember they called me Al;it was Al all the time. Why don’t you remember, I’m your pal?’
`You’re chained,’ I said. ‘Tell me why?’
‘I wear the chain I forged in life,’ replied the dog of debt. ‘I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?’ Then singing again, the dog said: ‘You will be haunted by a multitude of old spirits and a few living ones.’
Sure enough, I looked into space and there was Studs Terkel, only one week in the grave and back talking to Stephen Sackur : He shrugs and points to a table in the corner of the room. ‘You see that urn’ he says. ‘That’s the ashes of my wife Ida. All I want is for my ashes to be mixed with hers. They should spread us both in Bughouse Square’. And how does Studs want to be remembered? His answer is delivered with a glint in the eyes. ‘Someone who made trouble where trouble was needed’. (more…)

‘It’s sweltering for the moment in Zambia,’ writes Mwape Mumbi in his email. ‘This is typical of Octobers in Zambia. I’m heading for in the nearest water pond or pool. Writing and reading can be quiet a battle in such conditions, but I think I am winning the battle thus far’. Mwape Mumbi is a multi-talented cultural knowledge worker: a trainee nature and social independent documentary filmmaker, a freelance literature critic, art and culture promoter, creative multi-media producer, a researcher in African cultures by travel and free-study. He also has a background in the financial services industry – banking and stock broking. Already widely travelled within Zambia, Southern and East Africa, the US and Europe, he aspires through project “Separate Traveller” – his in-progress cultural documentary film – to highlight the mediation and alternatives proffered by nature and the aesthetics for personal, communal, traditional, cultural material and knowledge production and social transformation, an appreciation of achievements in pre-colonial sub-Saharan Africa in giving a rooted base and judicious illumination to contemporary societal pursuits, as inspired by temperate endogenous thought. (more…)