Writer’s Blog
Blog
Welcome, and a word about why I'm doing this
I have spent most of my life telling stories out loud, usually at a dinner table, usually at the expense of my own dignity. Writing them down is newer. Putting them on a website for strangers to read is newer still, so you will have to bear with me while I work out what exactly this thing is meant to be.
The Friends Who Never Left
Fishcakes and I met on the first day of school. Years later I came home from university for December, sat down with him at the Kingswood Hotel, and realised we had very little left in common.
South Africa’s Fault Lines
A mother at a Southern California park speaks Afrikaans, sure nobody around her will understand. Somebody does. An essay on the old South African fault lines, and which of them survive the flight to Orange County.
The Joke Without a Punchline
Leon Lazarus on growing up under apartheid and the strange, necessary work humour did for his family when the country stopped making sense.
Driving Friends Home
Leon Lazarus on the story from Barking at Dogs that stays with him longest, and what one dangerous late-night drive taught him about friendship under apartheid.
Take a moment to subscribe to one of my podcasts
Short stories or music, I have a podcast for everyone looking for one of those two things.