Karina Festival

Karavan Press Literary Festival 2025

We are delighted to announce that the fourth KARAVAN PRESS LITERARY FESTIVAL is going to take place on Saturday, 12 April 2025, at the wonderful South African Centre for the Netherlands and Flanders – SASNEV – 4 Central Square, Pinelands, Cape Town, 7405. Thank you to Eureka Barnard and the Staff of SASNEV for hosting us!

As part of the festival, Penny Haw, winner of the 2024 Philida Literary Award, will deliver the André Brink Memorial Lecture – 6 February 2025 was the 10th anniversary of André’s death, and on 29 May 2025, he would have turned 90. We will remember and celebrate together!

Also as part of the festival, Qarnita Loxton and Amy Heydenrych are offering a Creative Writing Workshop. For all details, please see below.

EVENT 1 09:30-10:15  LIFE AND LAUGHTER

Diane Awerbuck, Lisa Tredoux and Gail Gilbride speak to Nick Clelland about how to use humour in literature across the genres to address important themes that are not necessarily always funny.

EVENT 2 10:30-11:15  FINDING ONESELF

Sarah Isaacs, Anna Stroud, Kharys Ateh Laue and Lester Walbrugh talk to John Maytham about their young characters’ search for who they are and how they want to be in the world when the world is unwilling to cooperate.

COFFEE / TEA BREAK

EVENT 3 12:00-12:45  SECOND CHANCES

“Sometimes the only thing you can do to change is to leave.” (Qarnita Loxton)

Amy Heydenrych, Stephen Symons & Alex Latimer talk to Karina M. Szczurek about their characters’ opportunities for change.

EVENT 4 13:00-13:45 

ANDRÉ BRINK MEMORIAL LECTURE

“Influences and Legacies” – PENNY HAW, winner of the 2024 Philida Literary Award

FREE ENTRY TO ALL EVENTS AT SASNEV!

~ ~ ~

WORKSHOP 15:30-17:30

6 Banksia Road, Rosebank, 7700 Cape Town

(Please note change of venue for the workshop!)

OPENING THE DOOR TO YOUR STORY 

Join authors and collaborators – QARNITA LOXTON and AMY HEYDENRYCH – for an intimate, nurturing creative writing workshop. Get to the heart of your story, uncover the theme of your writing project and work through any potential blocks to your creative writing process in a quiet, encouraging setting.

Snacks and drinks will be served.

The workshop is open to writers of all levels, including beginners. Only 10 spots available. Please book early to avoid disappointment.

To book your spot for the workshop, please contact Karina: karavanpressfestival@outlook.com

WORKSHOP FEE R300

Books will be available for sale at great prices throughout the festival!

Karina Author, Book, Event

The Smell of Blood & Other Stories by Caitlin Stobie and Kharys Ateh Laue launched at EB Cavendish

We launched The Smell Of Blood & Other Stories by Caitlin Stobie & Kharys Ateh Laue at Exclusive Books Cavendish last night. We spoke about storytelling in general and the short story in particular, about the creative process involved in collaborating on a collection of this nature, and the challenges and joys of writing about intimacy, sexuality, violence and coming of age in a country as complex and fascinating as South Africa of the eighties and nineties.

Thank you to the authors (you are remarkable!) and to everyone who shared this special moment with us (so great to engage).

A special thank you to Linda and the EB Cavendish team. Thank you for all your kind words and for championing our stories. We are deeply grateful for the support.

Karina Author, Book

Karavan Press title: The Smell of Blood by Caitlin Stobie and Kharys Ateh Laue

The Smell of Blood and Other Stories is the product of a years-long conversation between Caitlin Stobie and Kharys Ateh Laue about feminism, power, and narrative positioning. The stories follow the lives of mothers, daughters, schoolgirls, and sisters soon after the 1994 democratic elections, tracing their coming of age as women in post-apartheid South Africa. Voices in this collection flit in and out of focus as they navigate the everyday violence surrounding them. Together, they create a short story cycle that reflects on both privilege and trauma, on cherished memories and shame.

ISBN: 978-1-0672224-7-5

Publication date: September 2024

Caitlin Stobie
Kharys Ateh Laue

CAITLIN STOBIE is an author of fiction, poetry, and literary criticism. Her writing has won the Douglas Livingstone Creative Writing Competition, the Heather Drummond Memorial Prize for Poetry, and an Authors’ Foundation Award. She is a Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Leeds.

KHARYS ATEH LAUE is a writer and editor based in Cape Town. She is the author of Sketches, and has written for various literary journals, such as Pleiades, Isele Magazine, Brittle Paper. She is an Associate Lecturer at the University of the Western Cape.

Karina Author

Author: Kharys Ateh Laue

KHARYS ATEH LAUE is a writer and editor based in Cape Town. She is the author of Sketches, and has written for various literary journals, such as Pleiades, Isele Magazine, Brittle Paper. She is an Associate Lecturer at the University of the Western Cape. She is the co-author (with Caitlin Stobie) of The Smell of Blood, a short story collection published by Karavan Press.

Karina Prize

Great poetry news!

The shortlists of The 2024 Isele Prizes have been announced and the Poetry list features Melissa Sussens (Slaughterhouse, Karavan Press, 2022) and Kharys Ateh Laue (who has co-authored a collection of stories with Caitlin Stobie that Karavan Press will be publishing later this year). You can read their stunning poems here:

Instead Of Measuring My Life In Productivity | Melissa Sussens

Elegy | Kharys Ateh Laue

And: the winners of New Contrast‘s 2023 National Poetry Prize have been announced:

(Kerry published her latest collection of poetry, afterwards, with Karavan Press and Keith was the winner of the Short.Sharp.Stories competition last year and featured in Fluid: The Freedom to Be.)

All three winning poems will be featured in the upcoming issue of New Contrast at the end of April.

The 2023 judges were Sindiswa Busuku, Nondwe Mpuma and Sarah Lubala.

The National Poetry Prize sponsor is Bruce Jack Wines.

Congratulations to all!