bird-monk seding

This place is called SEDING, short for Leseding, place of light. Quite ironic given the darkness throbbing at its core and spilling out bubbling in the blackest rage when least expected. Surrounded by farmland in all directions, it is a settlement of about 700 households crammed in tiny structures. Average 7 souls per hovel. It used to be made up of ramshackle corrugated iron shacks that seemed tossed down regardless of aesthetics. Then the new administrationís housing programme kicked in. Man in the bush in quest of Bosmanís ghost. Finding AWB rabidity. Tranquility so deep it kills. Hate hounds. Beneath the surface quiet, such racist rotten-heartedness. & children dying. Starvation abounds. Raw sewage in the water supply. Crap in the taps. Skin matters. Ancient white beards sexing black teens for tins, food exchange. The soulís impoverishment. The starved get their humanity halved. And weekends of sex-tourism. Alcoholic stares everywhere. Deep fear too. Lesego Rampolokengís third novel Bird-Monk Seding is a stark picture of life in a rural township two decades into South Africaís democracy. Listening and observing in the streets and taverns, Bavino Sekete, often feeling desperate himself, is thrown back to his own violent childhood in Soweto. To get through, he turns to his pantheon of jazz innovators and radical writers.

• No of Pages: 120
• Category: Fiction
• Year Published: 2017