Robert Berold on Romancing the Dead

Gary Cummiskey's Romancing the Dead is a 20 page collection of dream fragments and images -- more prose poems than stories -- which orbit round the confused intersections of death and sex. While the content is dark, frustrated, alienated and at times shocking, the texture of the writing is innocent, straightforward and non-egotistical. I hope Cummiskey will take this direction further into longer narrative forms. Thanks to Tearoom Books for showing how attractive very short books (chapbooks) can be. From both writer and publisher -- more please!

First published on Tearoom Books

April in the Moon-Sun available as free ebook

April in the Moon-Sun by Gary Cummiskey, published by Dye Hard Press in 2006 and now out of print, is an astonishing cut-up prose sequence with delirious images shifting between Johannesburg and London, capturing the instances of experience through a simultaneous and multi-layered kaleidoscope rather than by linear perception.

It also formed the basis of a short film by Aryan Kaganof, called Velvet.

April in the Moon-Sun can be downloaded for free here

Review of Romancing the Dead - Kobus Moolman

With the appetite of a new razor blade, Gary Cummiskey’s latest collection Romancing the Dead (Tearoom Books, Durban), slices through pretence and politeness. It is tough writing. It is uncomfortable. In your face. Tough and uncomfortable and in your face the way Lesego Rampolokeng is, or Cormac McCarthy, in his early novels – Child of God and Outer Dark. But unlike these two authors, Cummiskey’s eye and ear are far too world-wise (and weary) to take themselves very seriously...Read more here

Green Dragon 3 now available as free ebook

Green Dragon 3, published by Dye Hard Press in 2005 and now out of print, contains poetry and prose by Daniel Abdal-Hayy Moore, Kelwyn Sole, Tania van Schalkwyk, Abdul Milazi, Allan Kolski Horwitz, Kobus Moolman, Ingrid Andersen, Michelle McGrane, Vonani Bila, Silke Heiss, Arja Salafranca, Richard Fox, Bernat Kruger, Khulile Nxumalo, Gus Ferguson, Liesl Jobson, Gertrud Strauss, Joop Bersee, Alan Finlay, Paul Grillo, Lesego Rampolokeng, Philip Hammial, David wa Maahlamela, Colleen Higgs and Gary Cummiskey.

Download as a free PDF here

Atio

Atio was a short-lived poetry jounal that Dye Hard Press brought out in those heady days of the South African poetry renaissance of the mid-1990s.

Published in 1995, with poems by Gus Ferguson, Robert Homem, Gary Cummiskey, JDU Geldenhuys, Steve Shapiro, Brett Lock, Michael Anderson and Alan Finlay. Graphics by Gus Ferguson and Gary Cummiskey.

Published in 1995, with poems by Seitlhamo Motsapi, Gus Ferguson, Alan Finlay, Rudi Roussow, Roy Blumenthal, Gary Cummiskey, Candy Neubert, JDU Geldenhuys, Steve Shapiro, Val Sing, Sonya Meyer. Graphics by Gus Ferguson and Val Sing.

Published in 1996, with poems by Roy Blumenthal, Ike Muila, Temba Mhlope, Gus Ferguson, Steve Shapiro, JDU Geldenhuys, Val Sing, Elza Lorenz, Alan Finlay and Gary Cummiskey. Graphics by Val Sing and Gus Ferguson.

Published in 1996, with poems by Sonya Meyer, Hadass Segal, Cyril Edelstein, Lars Dewing, Michael Morain, Robert Homem, Tony Ullyat, Gus Ferguson, Walter Saunders, Linda Colleen Saunders and Candy Neubert. Graphics by Gus Ferguson and Val Sing.