RaDical MiDDle - ColdType

176 | denis beckett
17
Reprieves
In the first half of “catch 22”, Joseph Heller has a
character named clevinger, an idealist full of goodwill towards
mankind. But then Heller suffers the shrapnel to fall upon
the just as well as the unjust, and the next chapter opens
with the words: “clevinger was dead. That was the flaw in
his philosophy.” for me, clevinger lived. There a beautiful
intrigue in Heller’s paradox, and a fellow-feeling. I spent my
life rounding up money. That was the flaw in my philosophy.
Money issues piled on my head until my mind was cross-eyed.
Twice a month, four times, twenty, I’d think time for a real job;
pay, pension, non-bouncing cheques … But something always
came up, something I had to publish.
early on a knock on the door heralded a young shy guy
who said he was the roodepoort correspondent of The Star.
With Jo’burg arrogance my eyes glazed over. What could a
roodepoort correspondent write that I would want to publish?
He said he’d gone to meet the leader of one of the neo-fascist