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PROFILES M
Marguerite Abouet was born in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, in 1971 where she grew up with her family in the vibrant area of Yopougon until the age of 12. Upon her arrival in Paris, she discovered the wealth of libraries and developed a passion for books and started writing novels that she would not let anyone read, becoming in turn punk, super nanny for triplets and grannies, and waitress. After a career as a legal assistant, she and her husband Clément Oubrerie created the character of Aya in a first graphic novel in 2005. Highly acclaimed among readers (350 000 copies sold) and by the critics (prize at the Festival d’Angoulême in 2006 and prize of the Point in 2007), the series was translated into 15 different languages. Since the success of Aya de Yopougon – now being made into an animated film for release later this year – she has dedicated her time to writing and the association she founded, Des livres pour tous (Books for all), which aims at making books accessible to children of Africa and creating home libraries in neighbourhoods. Marguerite now lives near Paris.
Max du Preez is one of Southern Africa's foremost storytellers. His thesis is that one can "choose one's ancestors". Popularising history – and retelling it without ideological or sectarian baggage – has become his passion. He is currently working on what he calls his "magnum opus", a study of spirituality and civilisation in sub-Saharan Africa before the colonial era. Between books Du Preez works as a political analyst, newspaper columnist and independent documentary film maker. His books include Pale Native, Oranje Blanje Blue, Of Warriors, Lovers and Prophets and Of Tricksters, Tyrants and Turncoats. He is a Fellow of the University of Fort Hare and an honorary research fellow in media studies at UCT. He received the Nat Nakasa Award for courageous journalism from the SA National Editors' Forum in 2008 and was named the Yale Globalist International Journalist in 2006.
Meg van der Merwe was born in South Africa in 1978. She read English at Oxford and is a graduate of the MA course in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. She teaches English literature and Creative Writing at the UWC and lives in Cape Town.
After studying drama at UCT and acting and directing in Joburg for a number of years, Melinda Ferguson went out to do some narcotic research. As a result of her travels, in 2006 her memoir Smacked, a highly personal and harsh look at the world of addiction was published to critical acclaim. It soon became a best seller heralding an international film deal and a successful speaker’s career for the author. Last year Hooked: Secrets and highs of a sober addict was published by Penguin who also re-issued Smacked . Both books have recently found an audience in Australia. Today she works as the Features Editor at True Love magazine and has embarked on an Honours degree in Publishing at Wits.
Melvin King was born in Cape Town, educated at St Owen’s Boys’ High School, graduated from UCT with a B.Soc.Sc followed by a post-graduate HDE, and after a number of years as a high school teacher was the founding head of Christel House in Cape Town. He is now head of Bridge House Preparatory School in Franschhoek.
Mer Roberts is the founder of the cyberculture art, performance and text group, 0rphan drift, 1995 in London. As part of this collaborative artist, she has written the science fictional and dystopian theory book, 'Cyberpositive'; collaborated with the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit on several text pieces including 'Liquid Lattice'; taken part in numerous international electronic arts festivals and conferences; exhibited visual narratives as installations in the UK, Europe and the States; published 'Meshed', the katacomic and has featured in DJ Spooky's 'Sound Unbound' in the 'Renegade Academics' chapter. Since moving to Capetown in 2001, Mer has continued to produce theory-fictions, experimental video, collage and paintings that explore speculative futures and science fictional transformation. She co authored the article 'Protocols for Experiments in African Science Fiction' with Delphi Carstens, and is currently developing an image text piece with him called 'The Shadow Operators'. She is dedicated to evolutionary fever dreams and radical hybridisation.
Mhlobo Jadezwini was born in Dutywa, kwaGcaleka and studied at Fort Hare and Stellenbosch, where he gained an MA and has taught isiXhosa literature and language in the Department of African Languages since 1983. His research field is isiXhosa poetry and he has served on various isiXhosa language boards. He has read and published a number of research papers at national and international conferences of African languages, and has taught isiXhosa and South African literature at the University of Leipzig in Germany – also guest lecturing at the Universities of Hamburg and Bayreuth. In 2006 he attended a UNESCO conference on endangered languages in Mali, followed in 2007 by a UNESCO conference on sharing of good practice in African languages. His publications include the children’s book UTshepo Mde / Tall Enough (recently translated into Portuguese and published in Brazil) and an anthology of isiXhosa poetry, Umdiliya wesihobe.
Michael Rice started life as a primary and high school teacher before teaching English at the Johannesburg College of Education for many years. Subsequently, he consulted to the South African government and foreign funders on developmental and educational projects. He was Director of Academic Publishing at Oxford University Press Southern Africa, and more recently Special Advisor to the minister of education. He has published widely on education and literature, as well as poetry, short stories and has written for television and the print media. His most recent book is From Dolly Gray to Sarie Marais: the Boer War in Popular Memory. He is married to Ruth Fischer. They live in Cape Town.
Michael Olivier is a Cape food and wine fundi who trained at The Cordon Bleu Cookery School London. He has worked in and managed Lanzerac Hotel in Stellenbosch and was Public Relations Manager for Boschendal. Having run three restaurants and been featured in the national top ten restaurants, he is now a food and wine writer, hospitality industry consultant and food specialist. He also broadcasts on Fine Music Radio and appears regularly on the Expresso Breakfast TV Show. His first book Michael Olivier – a Restaurateur Remembers, was followed by two editions of crush! 100 South African Wines to drink now. His latest book The People’s Guide – navigate the winelands in a shopping trolley was co-authored by Neil Pendock and Anibal Coutinho. It was followed by Guia Popular de Vinhos – a guide to Portuguese wines written by Coutinho with Olivier and Pendock. He is now publishing Crush! – a free online digital magazine. He has been married to Madeleine for over 33 years; they have two children and live in Claremont.
Michele Magwood is an award-winning literary journalist who was for many years the Books Editor of the Sunday Times. She is about to launch her website magwoodonbooks, and is partnering in a new bookstore in Johannesburg called Jellicoe Books.
Michiel Heyns grew up all over South Africa – Thaba Nchu, Kimberley, Grahamstown, Cape Town – and was educated at Stellenbosch and Cambridge Universities. For much of his adult life he was an academic, lecturing in English at Stellenbosch, but after his first novel, The Children’s Day, he took to writing full-time. Five have now been published: the fourth, Bodies Politic, won the 2009 Herman Charles Bosman Prize and the most recent is Lost Ground. In 2006 he translated two works by Marlene van Niekerk, Memorandum and Agaat, which won the English Academy's Sol Plaatje Award for Translating in 2008 and was awarded the Sunday Times Fiction Prize for 2007; published as The Way of the Women in the UK, it was short-listed for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. He has also translated Equatoria by Tom Dreyer. Michiel reviews regularly for the Sunday Independent, for which he was awarded the English Academy's Pringle Prize for Reviewing for 2006.
Mike Nicol is an author, journalist and editor. His CV shows a certain desperation for what others have termed over-achievement. For instance, he teaches a course at UCT’s Centre for Creative Writing and tutors for the online SA Writers’ College when he is not editing (extremely exciting) books by Peter Harris, or (extremely long) odysseys by George Bizos. He has tried his hand at everything from poetry to magic realism in his early novels and diverted into non-fiction, including a short biography of our former president, Mandela – the Authorised Portrait, before resurfacing as a crime novelist. His Revenge Trilogy – Payback, Killer Country, and now Black Heart – some academics suspect was an attempt to make money. Until such time as this happens, Nicol holes up in a garret on the southern peninsula, loudly playing killer country music in an attempt to muffle the gales.
Mike Wills is a Cape Town radio talk show host, columnist and commentator. He writes for the Cape Argus, Fair Lady and Directorship and is the author of The Cycle Tour, the story of the Argus cycle tour. Born in Sydney, he went to university in England and first came to South Africa as a foreign TV news producer in 1987. He worked for seven years in various capacities at Talk Radio 702 in Johannesburg before moving to Cape Town as the founding general manager of 567 Cape Talk in 1997. He is married to Helen and has three children ranging from UCT to primary school.
Moky Makura is a publisher, author, TV presenter/producer, actress and successful entrepreneur. She was born in Nigeria, educated in England, holds an Honours degree in Politics, Economics and Law and since 1998 has lived in Johannesburg, forming her own public relations agency – Red PR – in 1999, which she later sold. In 2008 she published Africa’s Greatest Entrepreneurs, followed in 2010 by South African’s Greatest Entrepreneurs, published by her MME Media in conjunction with GIBS. In the same year she launched the first in her series of Bookazines; the Nollybooks brand features low-cost fiction and non-fiction titles aimed specifically at the young urban market.
