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After completing the Write a Children’s Book Course at SA Writers’ College, Cape Town author and illustrator Cayla Lewis has published the book she once needed as a child – a story about belonging, courage and showing up as you are. When Cayla was just five years old, she was diagnosed with psoriasis, a chronic […]
Since completing the Basic Grammar Skills Course with SA Writers’ College in 2016, South African playwright, theatre-maker and fiction writer Philisiwe Twijnstra has built a creative career shaped by imagination, persistence and bold storytelling. Philisiwe has received both local and international recognition for her work, which is rooted in memory, identity, folklore and the lived […]
BY ETIENNE LOMBARD The desk was glass, long and cold, and on clear days I could see Table Mountain reflected in its surface from where I sat on the fourteenth floor of a building in the Cape Town CBD. The mountain’s upper slopes go tawny in winter, patched with old burns and new growth pressing […]
Crippling self-doubt can keep writers from achieving their goals and becoming the best writer they can be. The good news? It’s totally normal! Maya Angelou once said, ‘There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.’ She was one of the most celebrated writers who ever lived, and yet, like most writers, […]
BY SHARNÉ DENNER Perhaps a common misconception about copy-editors and proofreaders is that they are bookish types who spend their days squabbling about commas in the margins of a page, pushing their glasses up their noses and making grammar police comments. Although this stereotype may not be entirely untrue, being a good copy-editor or proofreader […]
The single most powerful investment a writer can make is in their reading life. The good news? In South Africa in 2026, a world of books is available to you without spending a single rand. From the classics of world literature to the vibrant, urgent voices of contemporary South African writing, there are legal and […]
How one SA Writers’ College student became a publisher, filmmaker and advocate working to restore indigenous languages to South African childhood. When Siya Masuku enrolled in the SA Writers’ College Basic Creative Writing Course in 2017, he already had a year’s worth of momentum behind him. The previous year, he had successfully crowdfunded his own […]
Make your words linger long after the last page. Discover the power of quotable prose. By Banele Ndlovu My history with quotes For most of my childhood, the only reading I did of my own volition was of the humour section at the back of Drum magazine. I would sit for hours with a pen […]
When Martin Steyn enrolled in the SA Writers’ College Write a Novel Course (Skryf ‘n roman kursus), he had a detective novel taking shape. What emerged from that process was Donker Spoor (Dark Traces), a crime thriller that sold out its first South African print run, crossed into the American market to a starred Kirkus […]
BY SHARNÉ DENNER Whenever people hear that I left medical practice to pursue a career in copy-editing and proofreading, they tend to react the same way: ‘What the … WHY?’ Usually followed by disbelief, head-shaking and occasional mutterings of ‘You must be crazy.’ For a long time, I barely understood it myself. My exit from […]
