[The JRB Daily] The Caine Prize wasn’t what I thought it would be: Efemia Chela traces the real value of big literary prizes
In a piece for the Caine Prize blog titled ‘An Unexpected Prize’, Efemia Chela describes how losing out on the…
In a piece for the Caine Prize blog titled ‘An Unexpected Prize’, Efemia Chela describes how losing out on the…
Writing for the New Yorker, The JRB Editorial Advisory Panel member Petina Gappah contemplates ‘How Zimbabwe Freed Itself From Robert Mugabe’. Mugabe’s resignation…
The New York Review of Books has featured an article by Panashe Chigumadzi, titled ‘Soap and South Africa’s “Fatal Intimacy”‘….
The winners of the 2017 South African Literary Awards (SALAs) have been announced. The SALAs are awarded annually by the…
Six African authors have made the longlist for the International Dublin Literary Award, the world’s most valuable annual literary prize for…
Welcome to the seventh issue of The Johannesburg Review of Books. This month, it gives me great pleasure to announce…
Jacques Pauw’s new book The President’s Keepers shows that children will have it harder tomorrow and that the children of South…
Jacana Media has kicked off an project called Storied, which aims to help African stories thrive—long term—and reach worldwide audiences….
Nelson Mandela altered the world. He affected everyone in it, in ways few will ever manage. He also died before…
Like watching JM Coetzee solve a series of Rubik’s cubes, only more entertaining: Wamuwi Mbao reviews Late Essays: 2006–2017. Late Essays: 2006–2017…
Read an excerpt from A Gap in the Hedge – the new South African novel that everyone is talking about….
Exclusive to The JRB, a new essay by Petina Gappah on the influence of Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s work on her…
Efemia Chela reviews Marie NDiaye’s newly translated masterpiece My Heart Hemmed In, a mixture of literary fiction, psychological thriller and…
Bantu Holomisa: The Gamechanger, an authorised biography by Eric Naki, is out from Pan Macmillan South Africa in November. The…
Jennifer Malec sat down with Nathan Hill in Cape Town during the Open Book Festival recently to talk about his…
The Johannesburg Review of Books is proud to present previously unpublished poetry by Mbali Vilakazi. The Broken Dreams Then they…
Manhattan Beach is the long-awaited novel from Jennifer Egan, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Visit from the Goon Squad. Manhattan…
Niq Mhlongo recounts his literary travels to Accra, Ghana—in 2008, for the Pan-African Literary Forum, and in 2017 for the…
Olivia Rose Walton considers loss and erasure across two landscapes, traversed by train. 1. Kayseri station, Turkey On the steps…
David van Schoor reviews Sarah Ruden’s bold new translation of Augustine’s Confessions. Confessions Sarah Ruden Modern Library, 2017 1. Sine…
Sisonke Msimang, who grew up in exile, describes her first visit to South Africa in December 1990, the year Nelson…
Victor Dlamini is The JRB’s Photo Editor. We feature his work on our Instagram channel. Don’t miss the ten-year retrospective…
Efemia Chela travels to the dirty and dangerous streets of Mauritius with Ananda Devi’s Eve Out of Her Ruins in…
Exclusive to The JRB, an excerpt from the newly published first-ever biography of the Nigerian poet Christopher Okigbo: Christopher Okigbo 1930—67, Thirsting…
Our November issue’s cover image comes from Johannesburg In Your Pocket. The photograph features Clive van den Berg’s sculpture The Eland,…
Durban, South Africa’s largest port city and hometown to dozens of noted writers—from the likes of Lewis Nkosi and Ronnie…