Download the Cape Town Book Fair programme - PULP

If there’s a book out there for South Africans by South Africans, they’ll surely
know. Give them a call. Leave a message.
Green Party of South Africa. They espouse many of ideals you’d like to see
Government embrace. Perhaps they even have a publication? You phone and
leave a message. Four days later, you’re still waiting for them to return your call.
From the budget web page, you suspect they’re under-resourced.
Green-South Africa. They’re doing good things with schools in the George
area. Encouraging for sure, but when you click on “literature” there is a single
poem. A fi ne poem, maybe, but not a book telling you how to do this green
thing. You call, but the land line is engaged and the cell phone message says
this subscriber is unavailable. A link to Resurgence catches your eye, a UK
magazine and international forum for ecological and spiritual thinking. If only
you could fi nd a local version…
On to Exclusive Books’ website, where you enter ‘green’ in the search fi eld.
The fi rst of 300 options yields a British publication with a dubious title Will
Climate Change Your Life? How to Drive a 4×4 and Still Save the Planet.
Humph! You happen to resent the gas-guzzlers who drive as if they owned the
road and all the world’s petrol resources…
You soldier on through 300 entries, feeling overwhelmed by imposing academic
treatises at staggering prices. You try Exclusive Books’ number and wait on
hold: Sail away, Sail away… the tune plays.
“Hello Daphne,” you said when Daphne answers, glad you didn’t sail away, “I’m
looking for a book that will help me ‘go green’. I want to live in an ecologically
friendly way. What’s on your shelves?” Daphne sailed away for a bit longer and
came back with an email for the marketing manager.
You called Green Clippings back some hours later, receiving copious apologies.
Telkom on the fritz.
“There’s not one complete book, to the best of my knowledge,” said Richard
Weeden, the editor of Green Clippings, “but if there was, we’d know about it.
11
CAPE TOWN BOOK FAIR PROGRAMME 2008
Sarah Ward’s The New Energy Book is not bad… It’s the only one of its kind
and I’m not sure it’s really a Joe Public kind of book. At R140, plus R20 local
postage it’s certainly a place to start.
“Leonie Joubert’s Scorched: South Africa’s Changing Climate sounds the warning
bells, but it doesn’t really give advice on how to live green,” says Weeden.
Another online treasure appears in the Going Green Directory. Tons of great
information and original ideas - but no “books” category!
Next you discover a blog about a delightful children’s book: How to Turn Your
Parents Green. You’re a parent - maybe “kid power” is the answer: put the
creativity and energy of the young to work, fi nding you go-green books!
Some days later an email from Maurice at Exclusive Books arrives. He has
consulted various store managers all round the country - they are the folk who
decide what to buy for each branch - but, he reports, “The current ranges of
‘green’ publications are not substantial.”
By this time you’ve discovered for yourself that most of the information you
want is available online, but precious little available in a book that you can
hold between your hands. The capitalist in you is thinking, Oh! What an
opportunity, a gap in the market. You always wanted to write a book…
But in your greenie heart, you’re thinking of all the trees that won’t get chopped
down if you keep it that way.
April 8th, 2008 by Liesl
A special report for the Cape Town Book Fair by Liesl Jobson.