Janet van Eeden Interviews Kobus Moolman on Light and After (And Reviews the Book)

After calling Kobus Moolman‘s latest collection of poetry, Light and After, a “revelation” in a perceptive and highly positive review, Janet van Eeden settles down with the poet for a nice winter’s chat:

Your poetry is dense with meaning. Do you spend a long time contemplating your poetry before you put pen to paper, or do you write a few words down and then play around with ideas until you find your poem? What I’m asking, essentially, is, “How do you write your poetry?”

An interesting question. My answer is related to the first point. Ultimately, I aim more and more in my work for an unconscious way of writing, for a way that attempts to sidestep the rational and cognitive mind, with its ego and its need always to understand everything, and to allow more of the instinctual to take over. And this is interesting too, because never before have I been able to do this without running the risk of obscurity. Now I don’t believe my poems are obscure; they just need or expect a different way of being read. A freer, looser way of reading. And this way of reading is related to a freer and looser way of writing. So that often as I’m writing I don’t have the faintest clue (a) where I am going and (b) what any of it means.

• Complete interview at LitNet

Book details

• Light and After by Kobus Moolman
  EAN: 9780958491570
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Special Report from Grahamstown: Siphiwo Mahala on Thando Mgqolozana and A Man Who is not a Man

UKZN Press authors Siphiwo Mahala and Thando Mgqolozana both hail from the Eastern Cape – and returned to their home province this week to attend the National Arts Festival and WordFest in Grahamstown.

As Mahala reports, “We had great time in Grahamstown and Thando was fantastic in his session. The audience was surprisingly receptive and women were particularly vocal… One of [the MEC's]… seemed very pleased that we are both “sons of the soil”.

Mahala published a treatment of Mgqolozana’s A Man Who is not a Man in the literary newspaper of the festival, Wordstock. For those who couldn’t make Grahamstown, we bring it to you here:
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