by Amy on May 21st, 2013
Come and enjoy an incredible five course dinner and wine pairing while listening to Roger Lucey’s music and his inspiring story, as told in his memoir, Back in from the Anger.
The event will be held on Friday 24 May at 6:30 PM for 7 PM at Cassia Restaurant in Durbanville. Tickets costs R290 and include dinner and wine.
Don’t miss it!
Event Details
Book Details
Cats: Biography,
Events,
South Africa
Tags: Back in From the Anger,
Biography,
Cassia Restaurant,
English,
Events,
Jacana,
Jacana Media,
Music,
Roger Lucey,
South Africa
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by Amy on May 16th, 2013
Noor-Jehan Yoro Badat from The Star interviewed Vanessa Goosen before the launch of her biography, Drug Muled, at Hyde Park Corner shopping centre. Goosen spoke about the depression that she experienced while imprisoned in Thailand and how she overcame it after a stranger approached her and reminded her to think about her daughter, Felicia, who was born in the prison and sent to live with Goosen’s friend in South Africa.
Goosen also discussed how difficult it was returning to South Africa after having been incarcerated for more than 16 years. She had to learn how to use a cellphone and get re-accustomed to wearing shoes and sleeping in a bed.
It’s been more than two years since Vanessa Goosen returned from Thailand. For 16 years, six months and 16 days the former Miss SA semi-finalist was incarcerated in Lard Yao women’s prison in Bangkok.
Goosen claimed to have been duped into carrying four engineering books, which were found to have compartments in the front and back hardcover and spine containing 1.7kg of heroin.
Babalwa Shota from City Press attended the launch and took some photographs of the event:
Exclusive Books in Hyde Park Corner Shopping Centre was a hive of activity this week when book lovers braved a nippy Joburg evening to attend the launch of a book penned by Joanne Joseph.
Drug Muled: 16 Years in a Thai Prison, about beauty queen turned drug mule Vanessa Goosen, has caused a buzz in publishing circles. And if the turnout at this launch is anything to go by, it will be on the bestseller list soon.
Book details
Cats: Biography,
Interviews,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Babalwa Shota,
Biography,
City Press,
Drug Muled,
English,
International,
Interviews,
Jacana,
Joanne Joseph,
Larissa Focke,
Non-fiction,
Noor-Jehan Yoro Badat,
Sixteen years in a Thai Prison,
South Africa,
Thailand,
The Star,
Vanessa Goosen
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by Amy on May 15th, 2013
Anthony Butler has written about the political figures and parties who have publicly spoken against the Gupta family, after they landed a private jet at the Waterkloof Air Force Base, which is a National Key Point.
Butler looks back to the ANC’s national conference at Mangaung and asks whether “the Gupta uproar could be a flexing of muscles by a diverse but loosely co-ordinated coalition that supported Zuma at Mangaung for tactical reasons only”:
The Gupta family has been subjected to unprecedented criticism during the Waterkloof scandal. But the conventional account — of decent men and women in the African National Congress (ANC) who have finally “had enough” — is not deeply persuasive.
The uproar could easily have been contained by a now familiar formula: bluster from ANC spokesman Jackson Mthembu; the invocation of the National Key Points Act; and the claim that “security” justifies both a controversial event and a secretive investigation. Race was also open to exploitation. In March, after all, ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe described attacks on the Guptas as motivated by the fact that family members “do not look white enough”.
Book details
Cats: Non-fiction,
Politics,
South Africa
Tags: ANC,
Anthony Butler,
Business Day,
English,
Gupta,
Jacana,
Mangaung,
Non-fiction,
Politics,
South Africa,
The Idea of the ANC
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by Amy on May 14th, 2013
Second edition of Bram Fischer: Afrikaner Revolutionary by Stephen Clingman, with a new preface by the author:
In 1964 Bram Fischer led the defence of Nelson Mandela in the Rivonia Trial. In 1966 Fischer was himself sentenced to life imprisonment in South Africa for his political activities against the policies of apartheid.
Before his sentencing he had spent nine months underground, in disguise, evading a nationwide manhunt. He was South Africa’s most wanted man, his cause recognised and celebrated around the world.
What had brought him to these circumstances? And what led to his untimely death after nine years in prison? This meticulous and finely crafted biography follows a fascinating journey of conscience and personal transformation.
Fischer was born into one of the most prominent Afrikaner nationalist families, yet came to understand that to be a South African in the fullest sense he had to identify with all of South Africa’s people. A Rhodes Scholar and distinguished lawyer, endowed with gifts of intelligence, charisma and integrity, he abandoned the temptations of power and prestige to ensure human rights and justice for all. Drawn to communism in order to solve problems of race, he offered revised versions and visions of both.
Covering more than one hundred years of South African history, this book ranges from the stories of Fischer and his wife, Molly, to the courtroom drama of South Africa’s great political trials, to the political intrigue of the 1960s and beyond. It is a remarkable story, remarkably told. Weaving the personal and public, Stephen Clingman’s biography is an account of tragedy and transcendence, showing how the miracle of South Africa’s transition to democracy was deeply connected to the legacy of Bram Fischer.
About the author
Stephen Clingman is the author of The Novels of Nadine Gordimer: History from the Inside, and editor of Nadine Gordimer’s The Essential Gesture: Writing, Politics and Places. Born in South Africa, he is currently Chair of the English Department at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Book details
Cats: Biography,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Afrikaner Revolutionary,
Biography,
Bram Fischer,
English,
Jacana,
Nelson Mandela,
Non-fiction,
Rivonia Trial,
South Africa,
Stephen Clingman
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by Amy on May 13th, 2013
Not No Place is a volume that brings together a vast array of texts, essays, poetry, illustrations and photographs, which vividly portray the depth and identity of the city of Johannesburg.
However, the lived experience of Johannesburg enters Not No Place not only as something textual but as something present and irreducible. The subjective relationship of the contributors to the city over time forms the main fabric of the work and thus is interwoven with selected excerpts, citations, and reflective pieces. The themes vary between the poetic and the concrete, associative and descriptive. Many contain spatial designations, or references to movement: Much of the personal narrative of the city takes the form of a conversation, in letters, recollections and emails. Thus, the book offers a series of personal thick descriptions and a survey of historical and contemporary representations of the city collected over the course of its making.
About the authors
Dorothee Kreutzfeldt was born in Windhoek, Namibia, in 1970. She studied art at the Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town (1993–96) and is currently completing her Master’s at the School of Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand. For her Master’s she is working with a group of professional sign writers on a series of paintings for buildings in the inner city, Johannesburg. She has exhibited nationally and internationally and has been involved in a number of public art initiatives. She has taught at UCT and WITS and in community-based projects such as the Creative Inner City Initiative.
Bettina Malcomess works across disciplines as a writer, curator and artist. She lives between the cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town, teaching at several institutions and across the disciplines of art, design and architecture. She also teaches at the Michaelis Schools of Fine Art and UCT School of Architecture in Cape Town. She has worked on several collaborative, curatorial and developmental projects with the Joubert Park Project, based at the Drill Hall in inner-city Johannesburg, setting up the Keleketla! Library with Ra Hlasane. Malcomess has written for several artist catalogues, as well as South African art publications, including Sue Williamson’s South African Art Now. In 2010 she was awarded a joint fellowship with performance artist Peter Van Heerden at the Gordon Institute for Performing and Creative Arts (Cape Town). Malcomess works in performance under the name Anne Historical.
Book details
Cats: Art,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Art,
Bettina Malcomess,
Dorothee Kreutzfeldt,
English,
Jacana,
Johannesburg. Spaces and Fragments of time,
Non-fiction,
Not No Place,
South Africa
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by Amy on May 10th, 2013
Given the ever-increasing importance of marketing, The Brand Book is an invaluable marketer’s tool and an ultimate guide to marketing and brand management. It covers challenges faced by most company executives and marketers today, by outlining a new “how-to” approach with easy-to-follow illustrated examples.
A comprehensive guide to the do’s and don’ts of marketing, the book de-mystifies marketing and brand jargon with an easy-to understand-and-relate-to method, using examples at both local and global levels.
Through The Brand Book, Thomas Oosthuizen describes his personal marketing method, which he developed while working in senior marketing positions for many years and being instrumental in the success of many iconic brands. Using a new model which covers all marketing pillars in one book, The Brand Book focuses not only on how to build and maintain a profitable brand, but also how to make it sustainable and affordable; making it ideal for senior company executives, CEOs, FDs, non-marketers, senior marketers and brand managers as well as academics.
About the author
Thomas Oosthuizen has been involved with many blue-chip brands over the last twenty years – as a marketer, an agency brand strategist, and as owner of his own company brand. Through working with brands like Outsurance, Vodacom, e.tv, Emirates, AngloGold Ashanti, 20twenty and eBucks, Oosthuizen discovered a series of “universal truths” for successful marketing. Through his experience, he is able to ensure that the reader will have both a far greater grasp of what makes up a brand, and also knowledge of how to better manage it and ensure it has the best chance to optimize its value as an asset and a profit generator.
Book details
Cats: Business,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Branding,
Business,
Guide,
Jacana,
Marketing,
Non-fiction,
South Africa,
The Brand Book,
Thomas Oosthuizen
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by Amy on May 9th, 2013
Vanessa Goosen, whose story has been captured by Joanne Joseph in the book, Drug Muled: Sixteen Years in a Thai Prison, spoke to Jacaranda FM about her harrowing experience. At age 21, Goosen was tricked into carrying books with 1.7 kilograms of heroin hidden in them at the Thai airport. She was caught and jailed for drug trafficking.
In the following podcasts, Goosen discusses receiving a death sentence, commuted to life, and how she was eventually granted amnesty. She also talks about learning Thai and having her child taken away from her in prison.
Book details
Cats: Biography,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Biography,
Drug Muled,
Drugs,
English,
International,
Jacana,
Jacaranda FM,
Jail,
Joanne Joseph,
Larissa Focke,
Non-fiction,
Podcast,
Prison,
Sixteen years in a Thai Prison,
South Africa,
Thailand,
Trafficking,
Vanessa Goosen
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by Amy on May 9th, 2013
Jacana Media is proud to announce the release of Rumours a new novel by the celebrated Mongane Wally Serote:
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 post-apartheid South Africa, can Keke make a careful comeback to his country to re-join 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.
“Mongane Wally Serote is rightly one of South Africa’s most celebrated writers, and there is no doubt that his writing wears it’s polemical and political heart prominently on its sleeve” – Margeret von Klemperer
About the Author
Born in Sophiatown, Johannesburg, Mongane Wally Serote was drawn to poetry and writing towards the end of his highschool career and went on to obtain a fine arts degree in New York at Columbia University in 1979. As a cadre for Umkhonto weSizwe he lived in Botswana and London, where he became involved with the Medu Arts Ensemble. He is the recipient of the 1993 Noma Award for Publishing in Africa, and was also given the Pablo Neruda Award from the Chilean government in 2004.
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by Amy on May 8th, 2013
Nelia Vivier from Get It Cape Town caught up with Liesl Jobson to discuss her newly released collection of short stories, Ride the Tortoise. Describing Jobson as a “raconteur of sexuality”, Vivier asked about her candid style of flash fiction, which Jobson said “is about holding the moments”.
They also spoke about the recent surge of popularity in erotic fiction, spurred on by 50 Shades of Grey, with Jobson commenting that she appreciates how “it gave women permission to say, ‘This is what I like’, ‘That makes me feel good’, ‘This is what I want you to do to me’.”
The long-awaited short-story collection, Ride the Tortoise by the queen of flash fiction, Liesl Jobson of Plumstead, is on the shelves. Nelia Vivier gets up close and personal with the author who is internationally acclaimed for her mastery of palm-of-the-hand stories.
Out on the open sea, cold and wet, you catch the spray, the backsplash made by the person in front. It is the meticulous clockwork of a team, as you ride into the wind, over the wave. There is no time to think, only to focus, on the position of your shoulder, the movement of your arm, the turning of the wrist … 17 points in one cycle, experiencing rhythm and precision, like each note of a musical symphony. Knowing at any minute the elemental sea can swallow you whole. In reality, we always come home.
Mfuneko Toyana from the Wits Vuvuzela attended a reading by Jobson at the Wartenweiler Library’s Writing Center last week and commented on how her writing offers readers “the disjointed, jarring confrontations with the self; with the elusive inner being”.
Liesel Jobson writes with an intense, explicit sense of self-awareness that almost overpowers the reader who picks up her book – if not the author herself.
She admitted as much to the audience in a reading of her latest collection of short stories, Ride the Tortise, at the Wartenweiler Library’s Writing Center on Wednesday evening.
Book details
Cats: Fiction,
Short Stories,
South Africa
Tags: 50 Shades of Grey,
English,
Erotic Fiction,
Erotica,
Fiction,
Flash Fiction,
Get It Cape Town,
Interviews,
Jacana,
Liesl Jobson,
Mfuneko Toyana,
Nelia Vivier,
Ride the Tortoise,
Sexuality,
Short Stories,
South Africa,
Wits Vuvuzela
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by Amy on May 7th, 2013
Jacana Media and TWK Agriculture Limited invite you to the launch of If Trees Could Talk by Megan Emmett
Emmett will give a presentation and read from the book on Wednesday 8 May at 6 PM for 6:30 PM at the Origins Centre.
See you there!
Event Details
- Date: Wednesday, 08 May 2013
- Time: 6:00 PM for 6:30 PM
- Venue: The Origins Centre
Cnr Yale & Enoch Sontonga
Wits University
Braamfontein | Map
Book Details
Cats: Events,
Green,
Nature,
Non-fiction,
South Africa
Tags: Book Launches,
English,
Events,
Green,
If Trees Could Talk,
Jacana,
Launches,
Meg's Guide to Bushveld Trees,
Megan Emmett,
Nature,
Non-fiction,
South Africa,
The Origin’s Centre
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