Shirley, Goodness and Mercy: A Childhood Memoir
About this ebook
Despite Van Wyk’s later becoming involved in the ‘struggle’, this is not a book about racial politics. Instead, it is a delightful account of one boy’s special relationship with the relatives, friends and neighbours who made up his community, and of the important coping role laughter and humour played during the years he spent in bleak and dusty townships.
In Shirley, Goodness & Mercy Chris van Wyk – poet, novelist and short story writer – had created a truly remarkable work, at once both thought-provoking and vastly entertaining.
About the author
CHRIS VAN WYK was born in Baragwanath Hospital, Soweto, on 19 July 1957, and educated at Riverlea High School. He lived in Riverlea for many years before moving to Northcliff, Johannesburg, where he worked as a full-time writer. He wrote poetry (his poems have been published in Denmark, Sweden, France, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States of America and Canada), books for children and teenagers, short stories and novels. Chris van Wyk died of cancer at the age of 57 on 3 October 2014.
