O Suburbia

Born in South Africa in 1947, John Eppel was raised in Zimbabwe, where he still lives, now retired, in Bulawayo. Eppel's poetry collections include Spoils of War, which won the Ingrid Jonker prize, Sonata for Matabeleland, Selected Poems: 1965 - 1995, Songs My Country Taught Me, and Landlocked: New and Selected Poems from Zimbabwe, which was a winner in the international Poetry Workshop Prize, Judged by Billy Collins. Furthermore he has collaborated with Philani Amadeus Nyoni in a collection called Hewn From Rock, and with Togara Muzanenhamo in a collection called Textures, which won the 2015 NOMA Award. He has published three collections of poetry and short stories: The Caruso of Colleen Bawn, White Man Crawling, and, in collaboration with the late Julius Chingono, Together. His single collection of short stories is entitled White Man Walking.

About the Author :
Eppel's short stories and poems have appeared in many anthologies, journals and websites, including six poems in the Penguin Anthology of South African Poetry. His poem, 'Vendor and Child' was chosen by New Internationalist for their collection, Fire in the Soul, the best 100 human rights poems from across the world over the last 100 years. His poem, 'Jasmine' was chosen as 'Poem of the Week' in the Guardian.

Review :
Eppel's poetry rises above banal patriotism or futile optimism and sidesteps the realm of the politically correct. His poems resonate humour and warmth.' - Anthony Chennels 'John Eppel is a craftsman of high order; a poet and novelist who savages complacency with deft ironies; and a man who is faithful to the complexities of his rootedness.' - Dan Wylie 'Eppel has sent roots deep down into the soil.'- Nick Meihuizen '... his poems have nothing to do do with white nostalgia for the colonial period. On the contrary, they circle round an attempt both to embrace a past (after all, he has no other source of identity) and also to wean himself from it.' - Stephen Watson 'Eppel is a poet with a compulsive gift for the telling image ...he has clung to a Southern African idiom and concerns, even though expert in a "world language."' - Geoffrey Haresnape It is impossible here to really exemplify the full richness and variety of this collection, which at times shows off Eppel at the height of his humane powers, at other points descends unabashedly into bathos and brief whimsies. It is substantial, at over 80 pages, and as welcome on the subcontinent as anything Eppel has ever written." - Dan Wylie, professor of English at Rhodes University. 'I know of no other poems which depict more poignantly the experience of being a white African during this time of transition.' - Guy Butler 'Eppel writes in a captivating manner, taking the reader througha laughter-tinged journey to the dark side of life' - Grace Mutandwa 'Eppel's writing has been well described as energetic. It has been labelled irreverent. It is. It is brutally honest too. - S. D. Mullins 'He has the comic genius of Feste and Hamlet, and this allows him to see all kinds of connections in a world that has gone awry.' - Kizito Z. Muchemwa