March 28, 2010
Eco in the Darkness
Umberto Eco, he of
inter alia The Name of the Rose, Foucault’s Pendulum, Travels in
Hyper-Reality and How to Travel with a Salmon, is curating an exhibition
of lists at the Louvre in Paris. What a splendid notion from a simply
splendid person, a real-life, honest-to-goodness intellectual in a time
of mental dwarves. Lists, he says, are the way humans construct order
out of chaos. It is the way they make sense of a perplexing world and a
method of understanding the inexplicability of life and other humans.
I may be paraphrasing
him a bit, just a smidgeon, but this would be my humble understanding
of the great man’s thinking here. I cannot vouch for his thoughts on the
missionary position, one-ply versus two-ply toilet paper (though any
sane person would be able to deduce that with some clarity), David
Icke’s sanity, or whether the moon ever feels lonely, but of this I am
sure. Certainly lists are vitally important. They
are tools without which we are unable to make our way in the world.
Indeed, not to murder other people it is necessary daily to draw up a
list of reasons not to, not least of which would be lists of ways of
getting rid of all the bodies, which is really rather tricky when you
think about it. I have spent some time cogitating on same, and making
lists which are promptly destroyed lest they fall into the hands of
people who will fail to understand the true context and spirit in which
they were made and report me to the authorities. So I have found that I
cannot, for instance and strictly in context you understand, bury them
in our garden – it’s too small for the number of victims, and our dog
will dig them up. And I daresay there’s nothing quite as off-putting as
relaxing with a nice cold beer of an evening only to find your quadruped
best friend entering the house with someone’s foot in her mouth. As the electricity has just gone off (again) and
the UPS is beeping at me while I hurriedly finish typing this, gnashing
my teeth, I try to find the silver lining in this situation (it’s
cheaper than taking Prozac). (Ehm… er… ah… This may take quite a long time.)
Oh yes, having a
bookshop means never having to say: ‘Rats, I forgot to bring a book to
work,’ when the power goes out.
Posted by André Krüger
March 18, 2010
Reel Ephemera
I have to confess, I am not fond of ephemera. This is not a a sentiment that the majority of my colleagues share. My feelings are not popular. However, every now and again, I come across an item which makes me pivot on my axis.
According to Wikipedia, ephemera is defined as
"....transitory written and printed matter not intended to be retained or preserved. The word derives from the Greek, meaning things lasting no more than a day. Some collectible ephemera include advertising tr... Continue reading...
Posted by meredith kempthorne. Posted In :
ephemera
October 27, 2009
Zugzwang, by Ronan Bennett.
Zugzwang, n.: an obscure move in an
even more obscure game commonly thought to have originated in Persia,
whereby ritual war is conducted between two parties, sometimes
resulting in the loss of bodily fluids, mainly sweat and tears instead
of the more usual blood.
This is a novel that has all the
elements one would wish for in an intelligent thriller: chess, murder,
psychology and revolutionary politics, all set against the backdrop of
St. Petersburg, in the year... Continue reading...
Posted by meredith kempthorne
September 13, 2009
Postcards of the East Africa Campaign
Sold by us on Http://auctionexplorerbooks.com September, 2009
.
Postcards from the East Africa Campaign (World War I) & St. Helena. - One Album
Description : A collection of vintage postcards in one album.
All of the postcards have been loosely inserted (no glue invloved)
48 x Black and white (including one used, colour one), unused postcards, relating to the East Africa Campaign.
Publisher unknown. I am also not sure if this is a complete series or not.
3 x Bl... Continue reading...
Posted by meredith kempthorne. Posted In :
Auction Explorer
September 12, 2009
Tall Stories Makes A Point
We are attending the annual Knifemakers Guild of Southern Africa where we are selling books with a fine edge. As we are honed well, things are going swimmingly.The show takes place over two days every year. This is day two, and we are rearing to go, though tired in manner of canines. Continue reading...
Posted by Andre Kruger
June 17, 2009
 There used to be a vacuum in South African fiction, right there on the border between crime fiction and thrillers with contemporary interest. One that needed to be filled with fast-paced, high tension, relevant stories with recognisable, interesting characters set in the roiling society of post-apartheid SA. That gap has been filled by Deon Meyer. At the outset you will discover that he possesses that vital skill authors in these genres need (and often lack) –... Continue reading...
Posted by Andre Kruger. Posted In :
Crime Fiction
June 9, 2009
The Weirdness
 I have just finished reading Christopher Brookmyre's Be My Enemy and it was hugely enjoyable.He is one of the foremost satirical authors in the UK and writes a kind of crime fiction. I say a kind of because he is very hard to classify and label, much in the same way that Iain Banks is. He is often likened to Carl Hiaasen but to my mind is much funnier and subtler. While he normally starts out in a manner that lulls you into thinking that you are confronted with a run-of-the-mil... Continue reading...
Posted by André Krüger. Posted In :
Crime Fiction
May 30, 2009
 This is one of my favourite poems. Almost every night I drive home, from Pretoria to Johannesburg along the Ben Schoeman and when I reach the Woodmead interchange, I think of the Wally Serotes’ “neon flowers”.
City Johannesburg - Mongane Wally Serote
This way I salute you: My hand pulses to my back trousers pocket Or into my inner jacket pocket For my pass, my life, Jo'burg City. My hand like a starved snake rears my pockets For my thin, ever lean wal...
Posted by meredith kempthorne. Posted In :
South African Poetry
April 23, 2009
Just Unpacked ! Memorandum : a story of painting by Marlene van Niekerk & Adriaan van Zyl
We have just unpacked copies of Memorandum : a story with paintings by Marlene van Niekerk & Adriaan van Zyl. 
In this unique book, the text and visual images offer parallel narratives that resonate poignantly with each other. Adriaan van Zyl's series of more than 20 paintings portrays a patient's experience from waiting room to ward giving a quietly disturbing view of the soullessness of hospitals ... Continue reading...
Posted by Andre Kruger. Posted In :
South African Literature
April 23, 2009
Christopher’s Ghosts, by Charles McCarry
 This fascination with spy novels may pass soon, or it may not. I’m not making any apologies or taking any bets. Not really. I seem to be more powerfully attracted to good spy fiction as time goes by, as I age. (Or decay, depending on your level of compassion or charity). It’s like one of those exercises you would find in a magazine, edited by someone who took one undergraduate course of psychology, where you are asked to share with someone yo... Continue reading...
Posted by Andre Kruger. Posted In :
Spy Stories
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