AFRICA FRESH! New Voices from the First Continent An anthology of African writing only featured on the Internet until now, this book features the collected works of writers for the G21 AFRICA section of G21.net. The eight writers represented here are from around the continent and present an exciting look at cutting-edge fiction and reporting from the first continent today.Buy the book or get a downloadable PDF copy now! 
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Please make all remittances payable to Rod Amis. Again, thanks. |
Next Scheduled Update: Thursday, 13 April, 2006
After the Fool by ROD AMIS 30 March, 2006: Things have been very hectic since our Tenth Anniversary Special Edition a nd my birthday. First of all, thanks to all those of you who sent me birthday greetings, called to sing, sent gifts, etc. (Rhonda & Bill, Cheryl, Dragana & Dragan, Rudell & Leon, Nelson, Barbara & Rich, Riley, Ripple and Graham.) The Old Magician is much appreciative. Secondly, there was getting caught up with my Day Job of being a freelance journalist. My friend Matt telephone after reading one of the stories I filed and said, "Man, you really sound authoritative in that piece." I chuckled. I think people often forget that I'm a professional journalist when they read my noodling here. Or maybe it's just that most people don't think of writing as a real way to make a living. We received a wonderful review of Africa Fresh! New Voices from the First Continent in the Kenyan daily Nation from premiere literary critic and Northwestern University professor Evan Mwangi, which you can read here. (Free registration required.) I was quite overwhelmed with Dr. Mwangi's kind assessment of our effort. MPHUTHUMI NTABENI sent me an e-mail with the wonderful news that another publisher was considering a work he had shown me - he'd begun a rewrite on it. And then these notes: Did I tell you about the wonderful surprise I got when reading a biography of Nadine Gordimer - she's South Africa's first Nobel Prize Laureate for Literature - was finding myself quoted in the book by the author, Ronald Suresh Roberts. The book is called No Cold Kitchen. Here's the passage:Gordimer has been read as a cultural hero of South African liberation and variously re-read as a writer residually submerged in the attitudes of colonialism or elitism, even Jewish self-hatred. She remains a polarising presence among South African blacks and whites alike. Near her there are always embers. "Unlike Nadine Gordimer, [JM. Coetzee] does not borrow courage of other people's convictions," wrote Mphuthumi Ntabeni, the African correspondent for the online magazine Generator 21: "This might be the reason he was so unpopular in political circles, where attitudinising is the order of the day." I offered him my Good Luck wishes and congratulations. ... READ MORE 
Walkout! by THOMAS HART Austin, Republic of Tejas - I never understood borders. I'm a Libertarian, as y'all know, and to my way of thinking, borders just don't make a lot of sense. To my way of thinking, people should be able to travel anywhere they danged well please with no restrictions, no "May I see your papers, please," et cetera. Now I know this goes against the grain for a lot of folks, mostly them folks who believe in putting fences up around "their" so-called land, building walls and having gated communities where only the rich and tony and get in. Screw that! Do you see lines separating anything on this planet Earth? I don't. If the Good Lord had wanted folks to have borders, to my way of thinking, he would have put them there at the time of Creation. But he didn't, and there's a reason for that: US LOWLY MORTALS ARE PART OF ONE DANGED FAMILY. Families live together; they don't look for ways to separate themselves. To my Tabloid way of looking at the world, we are experiencing, here Amurrica right now, an amusing case of Life Imitating Art. Am I the only one that noticed that just about the time the television channel HBO started broadcasting the great Edward James Olmos film "Walkout!" the immigration reform bill came up before the nation and then - Lo and Behold! - all week we've have thousands of Latino students walking out in protest of the bill all over the country just like in the danged movie! Students in La-laLand, uh, I mean Los Angeles, are even walking out every day despite the fact that they is supposed to be on lock down. Down here in Tejas, just the other night, about twenty or thirty kids was arrested in Houston for taking part in the protests. Viva la Raza!! Now I know that CNN's Lou Dobbs and a lot of folks over the way in Arizona and New Mexico got this notion that they don't want no more Meskins movin' up here to El Norte and frankly, I don't get it. Why are people so uptight about us having a few more guys to hang drywall, masons, gardeners and fruit-pickers? I mean, come on! somebody in America has to do an honest day's work and your slacker kids, mall rats and yo' boys sure as heck ain't gonnah do it. Hell, without Meskins this country might not have any real working people left! ... READ MORE We know you're lazy. Here's a button for a quick translation of this page. Just click on the flag for your country. You're welcome! |
BRAD BALFOUR WITH LUC JACQUET:
New York, NY, USA - For French documentary director Luc Jacquet, making "The March of the Penguins," might have been success enough, but to see his tale of an emperor penguin colony, under some of the harshest conditions on earth, become a summer sleeper family hit and one of the highest grossing docs ever (and an Oscar nominee) should give him enormous satisfaction.
Narrated by Morgan Freeman, the film offers parents a positive alternative to the usual blockbuster fare. With his background as both a biologist and cameraman, Jacquet had worked on another film about the birds - "The Congress of the Penguins" - but his debut feature is now a testament to both the penguins' endurance and his as well.
G21: What caused you to make a film about penguins - don't you like humans?
LJ: I worked with penguins because they have an extraordinary story to tell. It's like a total epic with very strong drama and that's the reason I decided to work with the species.? I was also very moved by Antarctica, which is very important in my life.? But to answer your question, I like humans, too.
G21: Antarctica is very important in your life?
LJ: I went to Antarctica the first time in 1992. I was 24 years old and I spent 14 months there and was incredibly impressed. I grew up in a mountainous region and I like these types of challenges and confrontations with the elements and I was really moved by Antarctica then and I've been drawn back always.
G21: When did you know you had a story to tell, that it could be made into a narrative?
LJ: I had this feeling for a very long time; I've been doing documentaries for television for a long time, approximately 12 years, and I waited as long as I could. I wanted to have the professional competency to do it and also needed to have some sort of reputation to pull it off.? But, I always had the story within me. I always felt that I had this privilege of this access to this story. ... READ MORE
TABLOID HART: THOMAS HART sees life imitating art in the student protest walkouts around the country and takes on the immigration debate in the United States. "Walkout"
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| Rock n' Roll (short version) |
Two young artists create amazing sculptures on a beach near New York City. |
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