Onderhoud: Knapsak vol Karoo I deur Julienne du Toit en Chris Marais

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Chris Marais en Julienne du Toit (foto: Adelle Horler)

 

Julienne du Toit en Chris Marais is passievol oor die Karoo. Hul boeke Karoo Keepsakes en Karoo Keepsakes II is nou ook in Afrikaans beskikbaar. Hulle gesels met Naomi Meyer oor al die hartstale van die Karoo.

Hallo Julienne, waarom het jy en Chris Knapsak vol Karoo I en II nou in Afrikaans geskryf – en was daar een idee/emosie/faktor waaruit die boek ontspring het, of kan jy verskillende faktore as inspirasie noem?

After we first wrote and published Karoo Keepsakes (2009) and then the sequel, Karoo Keepsakes II in 2013, many people told us they would love to read them in Afrikaans.

Afrikaans is, of course, the home language of the Karoo, so it’s a natural progression.

We are lucky enough to be living next to a talented Afrikaans translator, Melina Smit (also a drama teacher at Hoërskool Cradock, and a cabaret singer). She took our lively copy and made it just as vibrant in Afrikaans. Fellow teacher Jurie Taljaard proofread it. It’s a real homegrown Karoo product.

So that’s how Knapsak vol Karoo I and II came into being. Actually, Melina thought of the title Die Karoo in jou Knapsak, which has a lovely ring to it. But when we visited singer and healer Antoinette Pienaar on the farm Theefontein near Beaufort West, and told her about our plans, she refined the idea and suggested the shorter title: Knapsak vol Karoo.

We knew only too well how expensive it is to print books (we’ve reprinted our first Karoo Keepsakes book three times already), so we opted to make the Afrikaans books electronic to start with.

Depending on demand (which comes mostly from South Africa’s cities, we’ve noticed) we’ll consider printing them.

Wat was die moeilikste aspek van die skryfproses van hierdie spesifieke boek in Afrikaans, en hoekom?

When we moved to the Karoo in 2007, our Afrikaans was abysmal. Truly, truly bad. In Johannesburg we almost never spoke Afrikaans.

But since we both come from Afrikaans families (who both sent us to English schools, incidentally) the language just needed to be awakened. That happened when we moved to Cradock.

Even so, our Afrikaans is not nearly good enough to write in the language, which is why we hired Melina. She brought such a sparkle to the words. During the translation process she would bring across her work every afternoon and read it out aloud to us over a steaming teapot of rooibos. It was such a lovely process.

The hardest part was that we were unfamiliar with some idiomatic phrases and words, so sometimes we just had to trust that the language was right.  

Het julle op enige plek in die skryf en saamstel van die oorspronklike Engelse boeke ‘n dooie punt bereik, en indien wel, wat het veroorsaak dat jul dit kon oorkom?

We’d already had five books published through Struik (now merged with Penguin and Random House) by 2006 (two on Namibia and two on South Africa’s coastline, and one on bars in Southern Africa).

In 2007, when we moved to Cradock, we decided we wanted to publish a book on the Karoo ourselves. But publishing is not an easy business. Where do you even start?

Where do you find a good editor? A proofreader? Someone who knows how to design a book? Where do you have it printed? How do you get quotes? How many tons do the books weigh and how to you get them to Cradock? How do you distribute them and to whom? It was quite daunting.

Fortunately, we had kept contact with our publishing manager at Struik, Dominique le Roux. By 2008 she’d left and had gone freelance herself, starting up a business called

Moonshine Media. Dominique knew exactly what steps we had to go through. We hired her to be our publishing manager, and she smoothed our path to independent publishing.

One of the first things she did was approach a small design company called Inkfish. They came up with the original look and the little design devices. (We’ve worked with them on and off ever since. They’ve helped us with everything from our business cards to our website and e-bookstore (http://mccreadie.co.za).

Dominique even handled the red tape needed for importing our printed books back from Singapore (where the quality and the price remain mostly better than local).

It’s not a cheap process to print a full-colour, hardcover book. It’s pretty much the same price range as a decent house in Rietbron. But fortunately money from the sale of our house in Johannesburg helped cover the printing and other costs.

Wat was vir jou die belangrikste: die reisgegewe, foto’s, karakter, ruimte, atmosfeer of tema? (Of iets anders – en, indien wel, wat?)

The Karoo is such a singular place in South Africa’s emotional geography. It is the warm heart of the country, literally and figuratively. The people are so special here.

Just as special are the stories. Here in the Karoo, many people are natural storytellers. It was one of the first things that really struck us when we moved here.

In the cities, people tell and retell one another’s stories of crime and consumerism. In the Karoo, people tell one another funny stories, sad stories, poignant stories. They poke fun at themselves. Things that happened to their parents, grandparents and friends are recounted, retold and embellished upon.

So that’s what we tried to capture – through characters, history, animals, eccentricities and the land itself.

The biggest challenge was to keep it short – each “chapter” is only about 250 words long, with a picture. But in each one we tried to put in something to marvel at, laugh at; something that will move you or bring an unexpected lump to your throat.

Wat is julle albei se agtergrond?

We were both newspaper journalists, then moved to magazines.

Chris worked at the Pretoria News and Rand Daily Mail, then went on to become Johannesburg bureau chief for Scope, where he won a number of awards. Then he became editor of Living Africa (sister magazine to De Kat and Tribute), which also won many awards for the quality of its journalism.

I worked for the Diamond Fields Advertiser in Kimberley and The Star in Johannesburg before starting an environmental magazine called Keeping Track. In 1995 the title was bought by Penta, the same publishing house that owned Living Africa (which is how Chris and I met). In 1998, when Penta changed hands, Chris and I got married and went freelance. We’ve written for many publications, but probably the most constant has been for SA Country Life. Its readers are quality people. Then we got into writing books ...

Skrywers het nie ‘n pensioen nie, boeke maak meestal nie ryk nie. Waarom het julle hierdie boek geskryf?

It’s for precisely this reason that we decided to publish Karoo Keepsakes ourselves. Most authors (except bestsellers like Deon Meyer) get around 10% of the retail price.

(Many readers have no idea how little writers receive.)

Publishing it ourselves would yield more money, but it was obviously a gamble. The worst scenario is to sit with a garage full of books that cost you a fortune to print.

But we had done a fair amount of research, asking dozens of bookshop owners if there was an interest in the Karoo. All of them said there was.

Karoo Keepsakes has become, in South African terms, a best-seller. We’ve reprinted it three times, and it looks as though we’ll have to do a fourth print run fairly soon. Its sequel, Karoo Keepsakes II, has also done very well.

In the process, we have learnt the ins and outs of independent publishing. It was a very valuable learning curve, and we take those lessons learnt forward into future projects.

Vertel asseblief vir ons lesers van nog Karooboeke of ander projekte waarmee julle besig is?

We’re terribly excited because we’ve just brought out a range of Karoo e-books to join Karoo Keepsakes I and II, and Knapsak vol Karoo I and II.

The new ones are 101 Karoo Towns and a fresh series called Karoo Life 1, 2 and 3.

All of them are in PDF format, and have page after page of beautiful photographs paired with our articles. They look fantastic on a tablet or a computer.

We’ll soon be bringing out a Karoo travel book suitable for Kindle readers too.

The prices range from R125 each up to R170. At the moment the purchase price is quoted in dollars so that it’s easy for South Africans around the world to buy them, but if the rand drops any further, we’d rather trade in rands so that locals can save some money.

All these e-books are available on www.karoospace.co.za/ebooks.

Incidentally, someone recently asked us who our books are aimed at, and we’ve given it a bit of thought. Basically our books are not guide books. They’re too whimsical for that. They are ideal for travellers, not tourists. For people who love stories.

That’s why we say on our website that these are travellers’ companions. They encourage you to go and experience your own stories.

Dis pragtige boeke en die Karoo is enig in sy soort. Maar daar is ook ander mooi dele in die wêreld. Waarom het julle die Karoo gekies om op te fokus?

Ever since we went freelance in 1998 (after both having been magazine editors) and started writing travel articles, we criss-crossed the Karoo many times. As one does.

It’s a vast expanse, hard to avoid. Like most people, we would wind up the windows, put on the aircon and crank up the loud music.

It took us a while to fall in love with the Karoo, and even then it was a slow process. A pause at a lonely windmill. Meerkats and blue cranes along the road. A kind word from a farmer. The compassionate space, and the forgiving silence.

This all crept into our collective soul and before we knew it, we had fallen in love with the place. Soon we were addicted.

The Karoo’s space allows your thoughts to open up, unhindered and undistracted. There is a sanity here you don’t find so easily in cities.

I remember meeting someone on a hilltop outside Sutherland and she said she loved the Karoo because she could see her enemies coming for miles. What an odd thing to say, I thought at the time. But eventually I realised what she meant. The openness makes you feel safe. So, in short, yes there are many places that are beautiful, but this is what we love. It was just a question of opening our eyes to it.

Also, we were at a point in our professional lives where we wanted to find a niche and specialise in it.

Watter reisboeke inspireer julle en hoekom?

The authors we really enjoy include Larry McMurtry, Paul Theroux, Dana Snyman, Antony Osler, Bill Bryson, TV Bulpin, VS Naipaul, Peter Fleming and (although he’s more of a naturalist) David Attenborough. In life science authors we also rate Diane Ackerman, Tim Flannery, Jared Diamond.

All these people are remarkable storytellers.  

Hoe kan lesers julle boeke bestel – en is dit slegs aanlyn beskikbaar of kan mens dit ook in boekwinkels koop?

You can buy our print books (Karoo Keepsakes and Karoo Keepsakes II) in independent bookstores around the country, and in other interesting shops in the Karoo.

They’re small and cute and colourful.

Or you could buy e-books from our website www.karoospace.co.za/ebooks. So far we’ve had good feedback on the payment system and the delivery of the download link. You get three downloads per purchase, so you can have it on several devices.

Any technical glitches or queries so far have been successfully handled by our webmaster, Neil McCreadie, on a one-on-one basis.

Incidentally, there is a special on at the moment. You can get both Afrikaans e-books plus 101 Karoo Towns for $30 instead of $45.

karoospace.co.za

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Kommentaar

  • Bert van Hees

    Hi Chris, remember me from the Pretoria News?? I really had a good laugh at the remark by the lady on the hilltop in Sutherland - can see her enemies coming from miles! Not really an "odd" thing to say, either she was speaking her mind, or she has a fantastic sense of humour. That's the kind of humour that keeps coming from my own mouth, without me even trying. I remember getting onto a commuter train in Durban one morning, going to work. As I looked for a seat, one of my old female school friends, Sheilah, saw me and invited me to sit next to her. To encourage me, she said she "wanted to show me something". Without thinking, I replied, "Naah, seen it already." It was only a few minutes later, when another old school buddy seated nearby, who heard my remark and burst into laughter, that I realised what I had said (LOL)  

     

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