This genius created modern fantasy but no-one has heard of him

A long time before JRR Tolkein wrote The Lord of the Rings, well before he even wrote The Hobbit, William Morris wrote and self-published his first fantasy novel set in a totally invented world, The Wood Beyond The World (left). It was 1895.
   Morris was famous at the time, a protean figure in Victorian England. He was an active socialist, painter, designer, and owner of the Kelmscott Press.
   But almost no-one knew that he had just invented a new genre, fantasy, that would spawn in later generations the work of such diverse creators as Tolkein, CS Lewis, JK Rowling, Neil Gaiman and George Lucas. He followed Wood  with The Well at the World's End (1896) and The Water of the Wondrous Isles (1897). Most likely he would have written more if death hadn't intervened.
   No-one knows why he wrote these late novels. Well is considered his masterpiece, and at the time was one of the longest stories ever written (228, 000 words). Tolkein's Lord is twice as long, but that was published as a trilogy. I've reread Well more times than I've reread Lord. It's a book to get lost in, full of characters and wonder. It's easy to see where it inspired Tolkein. In fact in one small section it includes a character called Gandolf, who does some magic... I also love his Wood and earlier The Story of the Glittering Plain. Lewis and Tolkein were members of a small literary club of professors and writers called The Inklings. They would get together and talk about literature and whatever they were working on at the time. Undoubtedly they discussed Morris. Lewis once said that after he discovered Morris he "got all the Morris he could get". You can get some here.

Why 'The Richest Man in Babylon' is one of the best financial books of all time

George S Clason's 1926 The Richest Man in Babylon has currently 505828 ratings and 2277 reviews on GoodReads and millions of copies in print. Clason originally composed it in parts, as a series of short pamphlets dispensing practical financial advice. Long hailed as a classic for all generations, it has been of inspiration and value to many many people. 

   But why is it so good? Yes, it offers practical and helpful advice; but so do many other books and they aren't as well-read or so famous. Is it that the advice is radically different from other books? No. In fact, some would say Clason's advice is homely and commonsensical rather than especially insightful. So what made it stand out and become viral in an age of print?

   Indeed, what makes this book still so special and so different from other books on similar themes? 

Quite simply, it's the power of story. Clason wasn't a brilliant financial advisor with insights unknown to others; he was a brilliant storyteller. This was his genius. The Richest Man in Babylon harnesses the potency of story. 
   We all of us love to hear and tell stories. If we didn't we wouldn't be human. Storytelling is primal.
   Consider the following books: 

•  The Alchemist
• The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari
• Harry Potter
• The Lord of the Rings

   and film and TV series like:

• Star Wars
• Star Trek
• Game of Thrones

These are all fables and myths for a generation that grew up without fables and myths. Ancient Greece is considered the cradle of modern education as well as the foundation of our modern world, but do you know what the Athenian youth studied at school? They studied the Homerian myths--the stories of the Iliad and the Odyssey. These stories were more than just stories; they taught morality and character too. The Romans had the stories of Romulus and Remus, and the legend of Aeneas. The Jews had the stories compiled in Genesis, the Exodus, and the Judges.
   Here, in The Richest Man in Babylon, Clason creates a classic financial myth through careful and detailed elaboration of setting and skillful differentiation of character. He uses the powerful device of dialogue to share his ideas. Dialogue helps create character and thus personalises the teaching. Much of the dialogue uses question-and-answer (think Quora and Google) and throughout Clason understands how certain words and phrases trigger the reader's response to the text. Indeed, the storytelling techniques in this book are the same that drive our current social media and clickbait world.
   In short, The Richest Man in Babylon is a story with power because of the way it is told. It works like the telling of a good joke and is likely to endure for a long time to come.

Kenneth Rowley 2017

#ComingHomeBook

I'm well into my publishing projects now. Last month I released a new novel, Temangwane, my fifth book, and it's doing well both locally and also is on Amazon. That book was finished in 2003 and revised only slightly. Now I'm getting my 2004 novel, Coming Home, ready for publication.

Publication means 3 formats these days: a local print copy, an Amazon CreateSpace copy, and an epub/mobi edition.

Amazon is great, but it doesn't at the moment serve the needs of Africa because packing and postage can easily cost more than the book itself. There's still much to do to kickstart an African reading revival...

Samson Comics

 Since I was a boy I've collected comics: I'm interested in the art of course, but also the form and the fact that they are a great way of telling stories. Recently I had an opportunity to talk about the biblical story of Samson and remembered that I had a couple of comic versions.

One of the versions is from a complete volume of the Old Testament in comic form. It dates from the late 1940s and was given to me by my parents when I was around ten years old. I always loved reading that book and learned the stories thoroughly by reading it.

The other version I used in my talk is a more recent version (you can tell from the way the panels are used that it's more recent) and it naturally gives its own spin on the Samson story.


Both are recommended. Because...

...it's still a strong story (pun intended).


Essentially, it still entices because its twin themes of violence and sex always appeal to human societies. And the subplot of Samson and Delilah is just as famous as that of Romeo and Juliet.




The full scans of both Samson comics are here and here.

How To Write A Novel

How to write a novel

I'm currently working on my 14th book, and I'm regularly asked for advice and help on how to write so I thought I'd set this down. This is what works for me, how I do it:

1. Write the OUTLINE of your story--a summary that includes at least one problem/conflict to be solved/resolved and at least one theme.

2. Detail your SETTING--this is the where and when your story happens.

3. Detail your CHARACTER(S)--this is who drives the story; you should also decide who is telling the story: is it the main character, another character or someone outside the story?

4. List your EVENTS--these are the moments of the story, e.g., Robert hits Keith, Thuli gossips about Futhi etc.

5. Plot your EVENTS--that is, decide in which order you will show the events to your readers; this is the shape of the story.

6. Decide on your main THEME(S)--this will determine the slant/bias/perspective you use in your revealing of the events.

7. Begin WRITING.

8. Keep WRITING--set a manageable target for yourself: 3 pages, one page, one paragraph to be written every day until the story is finished.

9. EDIT/REWRITE until you're happy with what you've got.

10. CIRCULATE copies of your story to a few readers and ask them to give you feedback.

11. Write the OUTLINE of a new story.

10.