A showcase for literary clout

THE UCT Centre for Creative Writing celebrated World Book and Copyright Day on April 23 by launching a special edition of the quarterly literary magazine New Contrast. This special edition focuses on the work of various writers within the UCT community, including established novelists like Professor Njabulo S Ndebele and emeritus Professor JM Coetzee, as well as academic staff and students from the English Department's "Creative Writing" course.

Professor Stephen Watson, editor of the magazine and lecturer in the English Department, said that the purpose of this issue was to showcase UCT's abundant writing talent. "It is in recognition of the unusual concentration of literary talent among UCT's staff that this special issue of New Contrast has been put together. It is significantly extended by the work of students who have emerged from the various creative writing courses and who have contributed to the publication."

The magazine offers a wide variety of literature, short stories, extracts from novels in progress, poetry, sketches, book reviews and investigative journalism essays. Watson said that readers could expect an eclectic array of literature associated with literary publications.

"This is a literary magazine and it is not a venue for academic writing as such. It really takes the form of a regular literary magazine as it has fiction and essays, but not the academic sort. For example, in this issue we have a remarkable essay by Andre Wiesner about truckers and the AIDS virus that is an investigative piece."

Though this issue features writers who happen to be academics, future issues will be looking to publish work from writers from all walks of life, nationwide. It should also be noted that New Contrast is not an "in-house" magazine, though it may on occasion feature academic staff and is published in association with UCT's Centre for Creative Writing.

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