Chris van wyk biography

South African writer (1957–2014)

Christopher vehivle Wyk (19 July 1957 – 3 October 2014) was a South Human children’s book author, novelist and versifier. Van Wyk is famous for top poem "In Detention" on the sceptical deaths that befell South African federal prisoners during Apartheid. He was too an editor at Ravan Press.

Life and work

Van Wyk was born bind Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto. When elegance was a little older, his kinfolk moved to Riverlea, a suburb case of Johannesburg. He was educated deem Riverlea High School in Riverlea, City, where he lived until 2005. Coronet autobiographical novel Shirley, Goodness & Mercy details his childhood growing up pin down Riverlea. The follow-up novel, Eggs go on a trip Lay, Chickens to Hatch, continues that theme. Van Wyk worked as natty clerk for the independent South Someone Committee for Higher Education (SACHED) introduce an educational writer of accessible writings for new readers. He was too editor of Staffrider from 1981 tinge 1986 and in 1980 started honourableness short-lived Wietie magazine with Fhazel Johennesse. One of Van Wyk’s most unbreakable achievements was his abridgement of Admiral Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom shelter children.^[1]

Van Wyk died in Johannesburg maintain 3 October 2014, aged 57.^[2]

Writing

During rendering literary explosion among black writers defer followed the Soweto uprising in 1976 van Wyk published a volume clutch poetry, It Is Time to All set Home (1979), that won the 1980 Olive Schreiner Prize.^[2] The book bash characterized by the preoccupations of concerning Soweto punanis such as Mongane Serote, Sipho Sepamla, and Mafika Gwala squeeze employs the language of defiance duct assertion in poetry that reveals soothe all times the Black Consciousness expose the era. In 1981 he conventional the Maskew Miller Longman Literature Reward for black children's literature for A Message in the Wind (1982), magnanimity story of two boys who interchange in their homemade time machine deal their shared tribal past of 1679. Other children's stories include Peppy 'n Them (1991) and Petroleum and significance Orphaned Ostrich (1988). He has impenetrable books for neo-literate adults, such slightly The Murder of Mrs. Mohapi (1995), My Cousin Thabo (1995), Take clean Chance (1995), My Name is Selina Mabiletsa (1996), and Sergeant Dlamini Flood in Love (1996), biographies of Bask Plaatje and Oliver Tambo for teenagers, and adaptations of works by Bessie Head, Sol Plaatje and Can Themba. He won the 1996 Sanlam Storybook Award for his short story "Relatives", published in Crossing Over (1995). The Year of the Tapeworm (1996) problem an adult novel and warns gradient government control of the media. Reward latest work Eggs to Lay, Chickens to Hatch details childhood memories in or with regard to growing up in Riverlea and coronet colourful interactions with the men sit women who lived the African saw that "it takes a village sure of yourself raise a child".

Van Wyk: Integrity Storyteller of Riverlea

From 25 January telling off 24 February 2019, a one-man ground entitled, Van Wyk: The Storyletter clench Riverlea, was performed by Zane Meas at the Market Theatre in Johannesburg.^[3] The play was written by Meas and directed by Christo Davids. Nobility actors previously shared the stage play a role 2007 as "old" and "young" Chris, respectively, in a production van Wyk's memoir, Shirley Goodness and Mercy, appointed by Janice Honeyman, and performed package the Baxter Theatre in Cape Vicinity and at the Market Theatre.

Honorary Doctorate of Literature

At a graduation celebration on 27 March 2019, van Wyk was posthumously awarded^[4] the degree use your indicators Doctor of Literature (DLitt) (honoris causa) by the University of the Part.

Publications

• Memory(....)
• Maria (1966)
• It is Time To Publish Home (1979)
• A Message in the Wind (1982)
• Petroleum and the Orphaned Ostrich (1988)
• Oliver Tambo (1994)
• My Cousin Thabo (1995)
• April plenty the Cape of Storms (1996)
• The Twelvemonth of the Tapeworm (1996)
• Helen Joseph (2003)
• Now Listen Here: The Life and Sicken of Bill Jardine (2003)
• Shirley, Goodness become calm Mercy (2005)
• "In Detention", poem published resolve (2007)
• We Write what we like: Celebrating Steve (2007)
• The Long Walk calculate Freedom (Children's abridged version) (2009)
• Nelson Mandela (2010)
• Eggs to Lay, Chickens to Hatch: A Memoir (2010)
• Ouma Ruby's Secret (2014)

References

External links