Something to tease every kind of bookworm
With just over a month to go before the second annual Lowveld Book Festival, the programme is just about finalised and the town is preparing for the region's most exciting August event.
WHITE RIVER – Due to the success of the inaugural festival last year, it will once again take place at Casterbridge Lifestyle Centre from August 18 to 20.
According to organisers, the response from publishers, authors and visitors has been overwhelmingly positive, and the event promises to be bigger and better than before.
For those who attended and enjoyed last year’s event, there is a whole host of fresh literary talent expected, as well as some of the favourite guests from 2016, including Tony Park, Athol Williams and Tracy Todd.
The balanced programme includes poetry, folklore, workshops, storytelling and story time for youngsters, panel discussions, historical Lowveld literature, interviews with authors, young-adult literature, performing art and a book fair.
The acclaimed South African film, Beyond the river, which was directed by Craig Freimond, will have showings on each day. This uplifting true story, about the partnership between Piers Cruikshanks and Siseko Ntondini and their decision to train together as a team for the Dusi Canoe Marathon, inspired the movie.
For your information:
• Set your GPS for Casterbridge Lifestyle Centre for the Lowveld Book Festival from August 18 to 20.
• Tickets for the various events have been made available for sale online from yesterday, but you will also be able to buy them at the venue.
• Check out www.lowveldbookfestival.co.za or visit Lowveld Book Festival on Facebook. Enquiries: 071-134-8172.
Here Lowvelder features more of the authors and speakers:
Gus Silber is an award-winning journalist, author, scriptwriter, speech writer and media trainer. He has an extensive background in newspaper and magazine journalism, as a reporter, columnist, feature writer and editor.
He is the author of several commercially published books, covering a wide range of themes and subjects, from South African sociopolitical satire to innovation in business to entrepreneurship to mobile technology.
As a speech writer, he has written keynote speeches for former state president Thabo Mbeki, and a variety of corporate leaders in companies such as FNB, Massmart, Deloitte and Discovery Health.
Richard Pithouse, an activist intellectual who has been an important contributor to the South African public sphere for 20 years, offers a penetrating and beautifully written exploration of the escalating crisis in the nation in the Zuma era.
His book, Writing the decline, has been described by founding president of Abahlali baseMjondolo, S’bu Zikode, as “writing that dresses the oppressed in human clothing”.
Fikile Hlatswayo brings you Blacks do caravan, which tells the story of a young South African family’s caravan journey, and the everlasting memories created along the way.
She says the book aims to inspire people to take time out of their busy schedules and spend valuable time with their families to discover the beauty of the country.
Hlatswayo and her family visited over 60 caravan parks in the nine provinces, and extended their trip to the Kingdom of Swaziland, covering a total of 25 000 kilometres. She was blown away by the warm reception from her fellow campers.
Karina Szcurek’s soul-baring memoir of her life before, with and after her marriage to André P Brink details a year of widowhood and a love to last a lifetime.
A homage to a marriage cut tragically short by Brink’s death, in 2015 at 79 years old, and a diary of creative dissolution and knitting back together, The fifth Mrs Brink combines enough literary “skinner”, salacious detail and moving romantic description to satisfy fans of her and her husband.
