Taking a holiday is what a day out at the Kingsmead Book Festival feels like. I blogged recently on the Annual Book Fair held back in May, so this is a quick follow up. It was indeed a glorious warm sunny day with loads of interesting panels to choose from. Aaghhh .. choices choices – too many for this gal with FOMO.
“Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! “
As it was, I had MUCH bigger choices to face as it was also the Hillbrow Street Parade on the same day, an event organized by the Windybrow Arts Centre, Dlala Nje and various other organizations. Brent Lindique (the famous “Good News Guy” ) writes about the parade heading his article: “Reclaiming Hillbrow … one Parade at a Time”. “This wasn’t just a parade. It was a time-travelling love letter to Johannesburg, its past, its imagined futures and the vibrant pulse of its right-now.” And 2 Summers has a fabulous blog with stunning photos. Also see these amazing photos by Ihsaan Haffejee. Originally launched in 2017, this year’s parade, with the theme “Imaginary Lines – None are free until all are free”, was given new impetus by Tamzyn Botha. Tamzyn is the mover and shaker behind Shade Brixton of the Brixton Light Fair. Please may this extraodinary event not clash with the Kingsmead Book Fair next year … although maybe I am not typical of the demographic which feels so torn at not being able to be in these TWO, VERY DIFFERENT places at once.
Kingsmead Book Fair 2025
There are 5 sessions (one and a half hours each) starting at 9.30 with a half-hour break in between. With at least at least 9 concurrent panel discussions for adults, you can see why choice is difficult. Here are three which I attended:
Umbilical Cords: Birthing stories from family ties
This panel was skilfully facilitated by Karen Lane who drew out her panelists in sensitive and thought-provoking ways. Kevin Van Wyk, author of Chris Van Wyk – Irascible Genius is deliciously self-deprecating and funny. He certainly has his father’s humour – Shirley, Goodness and Mercy was a complete delight. Although still profound and serious, Antjie Krog tended to be much lighter in tone than when she was interviewed at the Love Books launch of her book Blood’s Inner Rhyme. As with Antjie’s relationship with her mother, which was not without its complications (her mother said there was NOTHING special about being an author), Gavin Evans (Son of a Preacher Man) discussed aspects of his relationship with his parents with compassion and poignancy. Generally a wonderful panel.
Taking the GNU by the horns: Can there be concensus in politics?
Nerine Khan chaired a panel which was meant to focus on Tony Leon’s book Being There: Backstories from the Political Front but was in fact a much wider discussion between Tony Leon, the journalist Stephen Grootes and Busani Ngcaweni (academic, journalist, and Deputy Director-General in The Presidency). There were obvious disagreements between Tony Leon and Busani Ngcaweni about the stability of the GNU, with Busani arguing that the signs of stability included regular cabinet meetings, different issues being tabled, debates happening, and with no decisions being taken without moderation (the budget was just one example). Busani argued that party differences on issues like transformation, on changes such as the BELA Act (Basic Education and Learning Amendment) – he did not mention the National Health Act- and different views around geopolitics, were not unsolvable. He pointed out how no party in the GNU has raised wanting to change the Constitution, which for him would be a fundamental stumbling block. In his view the main difference between parties centred around how to grow the economy. He identified skills development, infrastructure development, renewal of PPP frameworks, and investment, being the main factors needed to grow the economy.
Amid all this heavier politico talk, there was a lot of more light hearted banter. Stephen Grootes made the wonderful comment about how in South Africa we CAN and do discuss politics.
An audience member made the comment that in the same way that people support different provincial rugby teams in South Africa, there are also differing political positions in South Africa. BUT, he said, on that fateful Wednesday White House Ambush Day, everybody in South Africa was a Springbok! This drew peals of laughter from the audience. And Busani said that if he was SA’s President, his gift to his counterpart in the US would have been a very large, very heavy, leather-bound copy of South Africa’s Constitution. This drew a general round of applause. And in a light-hearted but also effective analogy with the White House meeting, Busani outlined the rules of enagagement of a prospective husband visiting his future father-in-law’s home to negotiate lobola. Here the visitor is on the back foot. It is for him to listen to his future wife’s father. He cannot talk back. And he has to bring a gift. According to this metaphor, our President played it all by the rules!
Politricks:Making Goverment Work
The very experienced journalist Mandy Wiener chaired 4 panelists: Tony Leon again, Pieter Du Toit (prolific author and journalist), and the two inspiring political figures in local government: the Mayor of uMngeni in KwaZulu Natal: Chris Pappas and his Deputy Mayor, Sandile Mnikathi. It was definitely these 2 who stole the limelight as their achievements are remarkable and their charisma, their work ethic, their embodiment of hope for this country, is uplifting. The clear mutual respect and mix of humour and acknowledgement of differing skill-sets is inspirational. Chris loves the administrative issues and making government work and Sandile embraces the problem-solving and community involvement. We need to clone these two wonderful young men. While they gave many examples of the problems they inherited when they came into office last year (and possible reasons), as well as some of the ways in which they have addressed these problems, more detail in their book Saving South Africa:Lessons from the uMngeni Municipality Success Story is bound to provide the perfect antidote to doomscrolling.
Perhaps one of their most cogent of messages is their view on the disjunct between national and local goverments, and the resulting lack of financial support. Only 9% of the national budget goes to some 278 local municipalities (comprising 8 metropolitan, 44 district and 226 local municipalities). And clearly the larger the municpality the more competing internal interests there are, and the more difficult it is to harness some kind of “unified purpose” (particularly if there is a history of cadre deployment), as we know only too well in the case of our Johannesburg municipality. Also as Chris pointed out, in larger high density urban areas, communities are more fractured unlike in smaller towns where for example he and Sandile live close to each other, shop at the same stores, and “drink at the same pub”. It is of course a huge advantage that Chris Pappas speaks isiZulu fluently.
Programmes for children and teens
The Festival doesn’t only cater for adults. There are interactive reading sessions for children which included this year The Twins South African Bird Tour by Andrew de Blocq, peaking curiosity about local birdlife, and Coco’s First Bank Account, teaching kids about smart money habits. Teens engaged with authors like John van de Ruit, discussing his latest installment in the Spud series, and Tshiamo Modisane, shared her inspiring journey in “I Am Tshiamo.”
For those who missed out, mark your calendars for next year’s fair—it’s an event not to be missed!