Writer’s Block
An unexpected review of Children Of Sugarcane
20 March 2023 AD
It’s a scheduled looting day in the holy land.
Like with electricity and recently the water supply, the idea that these public goods and services are always available has been dismantled. We now have scheduled bouts when we have both and we’re learning to live with it. Like we’ll eventually learn to live with scheduled looting. We don’t have an app for scheduled looting yet, but I fully expect this to be rectified soon enough. Holy landers are an enterprising bunch.
The upside to this day of scheduled looting is that it’s a wonderfully peaceful morning in the derelict Highveld mining dump village. The usual hum of traffic and the buzz of the early mornings is absent. The birds are chirping, the sun is shining and there’s a gentle breeze flitting through the heavily wooded back garden at my current billet.
Close to perfect conditions to get some writing done.
Except that getting any writing done has been nigh on impossible for weeks now. I’ve been upcycling and recycling older unpublished pieces to keep some momentum going. The dervish is on radio silence. Patently her new found material love life is occupying her time and I feel a little abandoned. Maybe even a little jealous of her lover. He’s getting what I have started to see as my share of her mind in the deal too. Lucky bastard. Or at least I’m assuming it’s a he-shaped lucky bastard, it might well be a she-shaped lucky bastard. Still, for all my complaints, the wildness of this slowly dying city and the barren pages accumulating in front of me. It’s not been all bad.
A week or so ago, a dear friend gifted me a Natal avocado. Now this is a rare treat, given the GMO versions of the avocado that flood the Highveld food stores and markets. Puny, dark green, misshapen, tasteless things that sell for a small fortune are the norm here and it’s enough to make one avoid the fruit for the sheer depths of disappointment that arises from each nervous attempt to enjoy one over the past few weeks. So the sight of my friends slender fingers holding out the almost round, light green fruit in offering to me was enough to bring back some of the joy and peace I seemed to have lost hold of since being back in this unkempt mine dump of a village.
In her other hand, said friend held a book, also in offering. Now usually, being gifted both a Natal avocado and a book is enough to cause my spirit to soar unfettered above the grime and squalor of life or far enough over this abandoned mine dump Highveld village for a few minutes at least. But said dear friend had mentioned this book to me a few days ago, asking if I’d read it. I had not, nor had much inclination to. It was, after all according to the public hype, another book about the indentured labourers (a polite way of saying slaves) brought to Natal many years ago by the former owners of the holy land. Given that one half of my direct genetic heritage arises from said indentured labourers and that I spent my formative years living in their fishing village bastion on the east coast of the holy land; I was to say the least; not interested.
I’d lived in this insular, patriarchal, bigoted community long enough to not need any reminding of it. Or maybe that was just the one half of the family I’d been gifted by birth. Maybe it had to do with being a child of six and being referred to as a half-breed thanks to the other half of my direct genetic heritage being different to the indentured labourer bit. Whatever, my interest in a book about this crowd is minimal.
Life however is less concerned with the details of one’s upbringing and given that I have an abiding respect for said dear friend, her spirit and her vast intellect; I accepted both the book and the Natal avocado. Also the look on her face told me in no uncertain terms that the avocado gift was wholly bound up with the book, so taking one without the other was not an option.
The next morning I eyed the avocado and considered a breakfast option with some perfectly ripe pomegranate and yoghurt thrown into the mix. I also considered the regular east coast fishing village option of throwing in some salt and pepper in one half and going at it with a spoon. I considered adding some honey to the other half for a proper dessert option later. But I held myself back and let the avocado sit quietly in a cool corner of the light-filled kitchen at the current billet. It was after all bound up with a book I had an inverse desire for.
Given that I was unsettled enough by the move to this decaying highveld village to experience writer’s block, I had resorted to catching up on as much reading as I could. They are different sides of the same coin and the upside to being back in the mine dump village is that I once again have access to a substantial library to choose from. Except the said library is in several boxes; mixed in with winter sheets, curtains, hats and the assorted lightweight detritus of life, to make the carrying of said boxes a slightly less back-breaking task. And I had over the last few weeks already read the handful of books that travelled with me from the west coast fishing village.
Faced with starting to unpack the boxes and face that whole life I had abandoned over five years ago, when I fled this village is too much of an ask of me right now. The thought of the Natal avocado sitting there patiently is too much to bear. I relent and go into the kitchen and ceremoniously halve the Natal avocado. It’s perfectly ripe and I pop the seed into a small container with some water to see if I can germinate it. It’s a habit, learnt from my now long departed father. One half of avo gets spread on a hunk of a baguette, sprinkled with some Maldon and twenty minutes later I’m thanking every one of dear friend’s ancestors for enabling her existence. Suitably and deliciously sated in one way at least, and with no other unread book in unemotional reach or sight; I consider reading the gifted book. If it’s terrible I can always pause and remain non-committal about it to said friend.
I pick up Children of Sugarcane and make my way to the front stoep.
Thirty hours later I have only left the stoep for provisions and ablutions.
Writer’s Block is a heartfelt shukriya to every one of Joanne Joseph’s ancestors for enabling her existence.
Children of Sugarcane by Joanne Joseph is published by Jonathan Ball (2021)
© Jesh Baker for Oppi Stoep, 2023
