At recent launches, I was asked about being a self-published writer. Why? How? What? Who?

To begin at the beginning…

I have been writing for as long as I can remember. Not because I had to, but because I loved it and dreamed of being a writer one day. Letters to my mother, friends, pen friends from The Cape Times, and to my eccentric aunts; essays for the school magazine, short stories nobody ever read, and reams and reams of poetry, which I thought was my genre.

Buoyed up by an encouraging Matric teacher, I sent a selection of my best poems to Guy Butler at Rhodes University, and he wrote back to say he thought I had something and I should keep trying. On the strength of that hopeful message, I sent a selection to Bob Dylan, my hero in New York. Perhaps I got the address wrong because he didn’t reply. Perhaps he was busy.

But I kept going, and the following year, one poem was published in the English Alive anthology of 1968, one in the Anglican News in 1986, and one in a literary journal in 1994.

Not what you would call a runaway success, but I was out there, somewhere.

There was also a year of writing inconsequential articles for a small-town newspaper, 10 years of commissioned textbook writing, mostly English and History, and readers for primary school children. Then, when I was doing the research for my family history, I stumbled across some fascinating, lesser-known stories in the Archives, and I knew that the time had come to write a novel.

Anne Schuster, to whom I owe so much, was my mentor for a year. She encouraged me, believed implicitly in what I was doing, and suggested that I approach the National Arts Council for funding. I sent them three chapters, got the funding, with the proviso that I send them a copy of the published work, and set about completing my manuscript for submission to 3 local publishers. I won’t go into the details of what that involved, but eventually it was done, and I settled down to wait. After 4 months, there were two hopeful first responses, an outright rejection, some tepid interest, and more waiting. But I was almost 70 years old, so I couldn’t wait any longer, and I decided to publish Ida’s Line myself.

Out of Mind followed in 2022, and The Colour of Flying in 2025.

Being a self-published author, financing, promoting, and marketing my own books has been hard work - daunting at times - but totally gratifying because at last my words are out in the world.

And even if Bob Dylan is still a bit too busy to read my books, plenty of other discerning readers do, so it is well worth the journey.