Adult Alphabet
‘R for rent, S for sex, T for evermore taxing things….’ Rustum Kozain‘s poetical dictionary (abridged) makes the traditional dictionary hiccup, divulging the sex within the standard definition and the power imbalances in the pronunciation key. A is for apple, Ava and Adam; B is for their banishment, far better than Eden. C is for […]
The Curry Chronicles, Part 1
[hr] Rustum Kozain dishes up some definitives on the many incarnations of curry and the art, or science, of making it real. [hr] The world of curry is confusing. The root of the word, “curry”, is from the Tamil ka’ri, which means sauce/ gravy/ relish – a generic term. And so even a stew (the […]
Both Sides Then and Now
By Rustum Kozain Perhaps too short for the reading pleasure it provides, the 50-year old classic Ambiguous Adventure follows the life of Samba Diallo, a child of the Diallobé elite. In many ways parallel to its Senegalese author’s life, the story tracks Samba from his days at the Glowing Hearth Koran school to being a […]
A Brief History of Throwing Shit
by Rustum Kozain. Shit, muck, drek, kak. Faecal matter. We humans have a complicated relationship with our shit, one that dates back to long before Freud. Consider Francois Rabelais’s Gargantua and Pantagruel. The birth of Gargantua is confused with his mother’s bowel movement after she has gorged herself on tripe: birth and decay, life and shit. […]
This Young (Wo)man
Tumelo Khoza at Poetry Africa 16 By Rustum Kozain As much as I am loathe to discuss poetry along that old-school split of “print” and “performance” poetry and all the variants both branches spawn, it is necessary to remark, that the annual Poetry Africa festival in Durban has done much to dissolve that […]