Saturday, 25 November 2023
Wednesday, 22 November 2023
Outside the cave, the selected poems of Gary Cummiskey, is still available from Dye Hard Press. 162 pages of poetry from 1990 to the present.
Here is one poem from the collection:
Recipe
Take your favourite
book of poems.
Place in an oven dish.
Drizzle (as the menus
always say)
with olive oil.
Place the dish in the middle
of the oven.
Turn to maximum on Grill.
Don’t stop until incinerated.
Copies of With the Safety Off still available!
We still have TWO copies of Graeme Feltham's With the Safety Off available ...
Available directly from Dye Hard Press for R260, including courier to your door.
Monday, 20 November 2023
Christmas is coming and Chatsworth is still in stock!
Christmas is around the corner so why not buy a copy of Pravasan Pillay's Chatsworth as a gift for someone? You can order a copy from Made in Durban or Clarke's Bookstore in Cape Town.
Aiyo! still available at Clarke's and The Commune
Pravasan Pillay's Aiyo! is still available at Clarke's in Cape Town - either order online or if you are in the area, pop into the shop in Long Street.
Copies are also available at The Commune bookstore in Braamfontein, Johannesburg.
Coming soon from Graffiti Kolkata: Somewhere else by Gary Cummiskey
A new collection of 28 poems, Somewhere else, by Gary Cummiskey will be published in 2024 by Graffiti Kolkata, India. Cover art by British artist Paul Warren.
Watch this space!
Saturday, 28 October 2023
Sometimes we dream true
A collage by British artist Paul Warren, inspired by an unpublished poem of mine called 'Sometimes', which will appear in a forthcoming collection of mine, provisionally titled Wet Tongue.
Monday, 16 October 2023
Chatsworth available again at Clarke's Bookshop in Cape Town
Paravasan Pillay's debut collection of short stories, Chatsworth, is available again at Clarkes Bookshop in Cape Town. Either click here to order, or if you are in the area why not pop in and buy a copy in person!
Panel discussion on independent publishing at the African Women Writers Symposium
On Saturday 14 October I participated in a panel discussion on independent publishing at the African Women Writers Symposium in Newtown, Johannesburg. My fellow panelists were Flo Wellington and Dr Nkateko Masinga, and the faciltator was Shafinaaz Hassim.
Also at the symposium, Dye Hard Press author Arja Salafranca gave a workshop on the poetry and song of Leonard Cohen, with musician Siya Makuzani.
Tuesday, 03 October 2023
Glowing review of Who was Sinclair Beiles?
I found this glowing review of Who was Sinclair Beiles? on Goodreads today: I certainly could not have asked for more!
Thank you, Mat!
**************
An excellent 'festschrift' (or 'celebration'), rather than a strict biography, on the mysterious South African beat writer, Sinclair Beiles.
Beiles is probably most famous for helping Burroughs get Naked Lunch published at Olympia through Girodias, at a time when Burroughs was really strung out on paregoric and/or heroin. His most famous work in print is probably as one of the four contributors (Beiles, Burroughs, Corso & Gysin) of the now legendary cut-up compilation, Minutes to Go, published in 1960.
However, as this book illustrates, Beiles is [sic] quite a prolific poet and playwright and apart from the above two works, much of his writing has surfaced 'under the radar' and hasn't been the subject of much attention by either critics or fellow poets and writers. Beiles is someone whose quality of writing is as notoriously inconsistent as it is hard to track down and read his books in the first place.
What Beiles has in common with Burroughs is their meeting in Tangier and in Paris, an interest in drugs, an interest in experimental artists and writers and also, interestingly, a regular allowance from their families which allowed them both to focus much time on their writing.
I hope this book goes some way to revealing more about this great writer to the literary world. His poetry and plays have been criminally neglected and underrated and it is high time that his work is evaluated alongside many of the other great beat writers who are already firmly and undeniably well ensconced in the beat cannon and annals of history (in particular Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg).
Gary Cummiskey and Eva Kowalska have done a terrific job of compiling these (mostly flattering) articles on Sinclair and his art. This is the best introduction to a little-known artist.
If you can obtain a copy, I recommend getting the second edition which is revised and expanded and contains an excellent bibliography-in-progress of Beiles' works in print.
Gary Cummiskey in panel discussion on independent publishing
Gary Cummiskey, publisher of Dye Hard Press, will be participating in a panel discussion on independent publishing, with Flow Wellington and Dr Nkateko Masinga, at the Market Photo Workshop on Saturday, 14 October. The discussion will be facilitated by Shafinaaz Hassim. The discussion is part of the African Women Writers Symposium.
Dye Hard Press author Arja Salafranca presents workshop
Arja Salafranca, author of The fire in which we burn and Beyond touch, both published by Dye Hard Press, will present a workshop on the poetry and music of Leonard Cohen, together with musician and composer Siya Makuzeni, at the Market Photo Workshop on Saturday 14 October, as part of the African Women Writers Symposium.
Tuesday, 19 September 2023
International Exhibition of Surrealism anthology
Immensely honoured to have some poems included in this anthology!
Monday, 18 September 2023
Two copies of Graeme Feltham's With the Safety Off still available ...
It’s Yeoville in the mid-1990s. Enter Fig, a copywriter with a penchant for living on the edge – staying up all night, having casual sex and snorting cocaine. Drifting from seedy clubs to grotty flats, Fig continues his aimless odyssey … until the day he falls asleep in a client presentation and is fired.
Available directly from Dye Hard Press for R260, including courier to your door..
South Africa only.