New children's book with a cause

Isibindi: The Last Rhino
 



Isibindi: The Last Rhino
by Hernes

Isibindi: The Last Rhino, by South African debut author and illustrator Hernes, is a story about a courageous little rhino who creeps into your heart from the very first page. It is a story about the real plight faced by these beautiful creatures, sensitively told and beautifully illustrated.

Isibindi's adventure to reach the safety of a sanctuary to escape the clutches of poaches is by no means a clichéd (yet sadly also necessary) campaign which may leave you somewhat uncomfortable. It is heartwarming, authentic storytelling that both young and old will thoroughly enjoy. The purpose of Isibindi's story is to create awareness among our children, regarding poaching, as well as to create a sense of hope that we can indeed do something to save these animals.

Fun facts about rhinos are included to help children appreciate these magnificent beasts. May the little rhino in this book not be the only rhino our children will ever see.

 

Hernes tells us a little more about Isibindi, what it takes to be a writer and to illustrate your own book, and what you can do to help save the rhinos.

Hernes, author and illustrator of Isibindi:The Last Rhino

When did you first start writing stories and why?

I think I wrote my first short story when I was in primary school, around grade 5. It was a short story about a boy who lived in the time of the dinosaurs. I wrote several stories as a child, but I've had an affinity for storytelling for as long as I can remember.

 

 

Tell us a little bit about your debut children's book, Isibindi: The Last Rhino.

The inspiration for Isibindi came when I woke up one day in November 2012 and I went on to the net. I saw a post, saying that the North African Black Rhino was officially declared extinct. I decided that that was the time, if any, that I needed to start creating awareness due to the fact that our rhinos are poached to the level of extinction. If nobody does anything, we'll probably only tell our children about rhinos in stories and with the aid of photos. That is where the inspiration for Isibindi began. I officially started writing at the beginning of 2013, and illustrating.

 

Isibindi and his friend, Pant.

Why is the rhino in your book called Isibindi? Is there significant meaning to the name?

'Isibindi' is the Zulu word for 'courage'. So it's actually 'The courageous little rhino'. Being South African, I wanted to explore our native languages in the title and put it out to an international market. 'Isibindi' just clicked. It's such a beautiful word and meaning 'courage', what could be more appropriate for a rhino? If you read the book, you'll get to the point where Isibindi helps to bring down the poacher that is trying to kill him.

 

I believe that a portion of all your sales of Isibindi goes to rhino conservation. Is rhino conservation in particular close to your heart? Do you support other conservation efforts?

I do. Nature conservation as a whole is very close to my heart; animals especially because they can't speak for themselves. I feel that is our responsibility to speak out against the cruel ways in which people are treating animals. 

Isibindi really is a brave little rhino

Money drives the world at present. Rhino horn is in demand and poachers can get so much money from it. The poachers don't see the animals, they see a dollar sign. That is why I decided that I, as a person who really loves animals, should do something; should try to create something that will create awareness.

What is the most important part of the illustration process and why?

 

Finding something you're passionate about and then telling that to the world. The most important part of illustration is to create a picture that tells the story. Having a passion for cinema and visual storytelling, I think it almost became second nature to me to tell stories through pictures. So the illustration process is a step-by-step process where I actually draw several images of the same frame to get it right before I finally print it, to make sure that every character is in that single frame. So it's about where I place them to create visual interest in the image. Also, because there are poachers and some scary facts in the story, I had to treat it with a little bit of tact so that I don't scare the parents or their children.

 
What is the greatest challenge of writing?

The greatest challenge of writing for children is to make it as simple as possible. I'm targeting an audience between four and eight years old. They are still developing their minds and their own identities, so you have to make it as accessible as possible without being too far over their heads.

 

Pant, Isibindi's friend

What do you enjoy most - writing or illustrating - and why?

 

I enjoy creating the images. Telling the story through the images was the most enjoyable part for me because I could play around with images that people had perhaps never seen before. I have this one image where Nkosi sees Isibindi for the first time. He looks out of the window of his shack and sees the rhino eating trash out of the trash can. That single image gave me so much joy. I actually illustrated it and re-illustrated it four times before I felt happy enough with the final product to put it in the book. It happens often. Painting is not work for me, it's relaxation.

Best advice you can give to budding writers and illustrators?

 

Let's start with illustrators. Find your own style, firstly, because there are so many illustrators out there that the competition is fierce. If you have your own unique style, people will immediately recognise your illustrations, regardless of a multitude of others.

Then, for budding writers: be true to yourself, be true to your story and don't give up. It is not easy to be a writer. In fact, I think it's one of the hardest professions in the world. So don't listen to that voice in your mind that tells you, you're not good enough because you are. If your story is good enough, people will enjoy it just as much as you do. Never compare yourself to others, compare yourself to you. Take your passion for writing and turn it into something usable. Transform it.

 

Can we expect more books in future?

 

Yes! I have a second book planned – a children's book – to be released in May 2014, but I am not going to say anything more. Watch this space!

Isibindi and his mother

Get your copy of Isibindi: The Last Rhino

Isibindi: The Last Rhino is available in softcover and e-book format from AuthorHouse, Amazon, and Kalahari. A portion of the sales goes to rhino conservation, which makes 'Isibindi' not only a great book to have on your shelf, but an absolute necessity.
 

Like Isibindi: The Last Rhino on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IsibindiThelastRhino?fref=ts

Author profile

Born in Sasolburg, a small town in South Africa, Hernes grew up the youngest of three children in a house filled with books. From an early age, his love for reading became apparent and soon he started to write his own stories. After he completed High School, he travelled through Europe where he worked as an au pair before returning to South Africa. He attended the University of Pretoria and has a Architecture degree. A supporter of animal rights and nature conservation, he believes that change starts with education. He lives in Pretoria with his spouse. When he is not writing or painting, he loves to take long hikes in the South African savanna.

The Inklings: The University of Pretoria's Literary Society

Cast of She Stoops to Conquer
(Photo by Idette Noome, 2006)

The Inklings, the Literary Society of the University of Pretoria, is a dynamic group of students and alumni from various disciplines who have devoted much energy and time to promoting literature, creative writing and the amateur drama on the Tukkies campus, for over a quarter of a century. Many members have gone on to be successful academics, writers and actors, and have made their marks in various other professions too. In this way, the Inklings have contributed much to, and continue to make a mark in, arts and culture in South Africa.

The group was formed in 1982 and registered as a society on campus in 1985. It is one of the longest running societies on campus and possibly the only literary society to have survived this long on any South African campus.

Although the initial focus was more academic, the aims of the society became more broad over time. The Inklings is a space for people who enjoy literature to get together and enjoy reading, writing and socialising within a literary theme. Most importantly, the Inklings create a space for people who may be in other disciplines, but who also have a passion for these things, to enjoy them too.

The society started with a group of senior students who were interested in the Bloomsbury group. The late Professor Bill Maxwell-Mahon (then in the Department of English at Tuks and affectionately known as M²) encouraged the students to write a revue of the period to showcase their research. They decided to do a show on the period 1890 to 1914. They formed a group called ‘The Holists’, led by Wendy van der Stoep. In 1983, an eager group of Prof. M²’s first-year students took up the challenge to write and perform another revue, ‘You’ve gotta be joking (1914-1945)’. In 1984, the Holists wrote and performed ‘The Breakaway (1945-1960)’ and started a creative writing group. They then started working toward formally registering as a society on campus and finally registered under the new name ‘The Inklings’ in 1985. 

The name ‘The Inklings’ is a play on words. It includes the notion of ‘an inkling’, the society’s logo (an inkpot) and is a tribute to the original Inklings in Oxford, which included J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. Idette Noomé (née Skawran) was the first Chair of the Inklings (she was awarded the SRC medal for Best Chair in 1990 and is still Treasurer of the Inklings, having served the society in various capacities since 1985). She now lectures in the Department of English. Her contribution to the Inklings over the years has been invaluable, especially when it comes to keeping alive and guiding committee members in the true spirit of the society.

Creative Writing Workshop poster
(By Michelle Ganter, 2007)

The Inklings creative writing group was started to promote creative writing in English and Afrikaans and to provide a safe forum to expose one’s own writing. The third revue was collaborated on during the first meetings. Elizabeth Burroughs (née Nel), then a junior lecturer in the English Department, led some of the workshops. Since then, many of the weekly workshops have invited students from many disciplines to share ideas, poems and prose in an informal setting and give each other constructive criticism on how to hone their writing skills.

The creative writing group has organised several poetry competitions and feed Inclinations, a bilingual poetry and prose magazine. Inclinations was published from 1985 to 1996 to showcase the writing of students and other members, including lecturers and friends of the Inklings. Key to the publication is quality. The current committee is committed to reviving Inclinations.



Mort amateur production poster
(by Peter Hubbard, 2007)

The Inklings also produce at least one amateur drama production every year. They have performed over thirty sell-out productions over the years. The Inklings’ forté is comedy – some sparkling productions include Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man, Androcles and the Lion, How He Lied to Her Husband and Pygmalion, Brandon Thomas’s Charley’s Aunt (from Brazil where the nuts come from…), P.G. Wodehouse and Ian Hay’s Leave It to Psmith, various Stoppard productions and some productions based on Terry Pratchett novels.

She Stoops to Conquer
(Photo by Idette Noome, 2006)

The Inklings have made a point of presenting plays and setworks seldom seen on the South African stage, including the classic Lysistrata by Aristophanes. Oliver Goldsmith’s She Stoops to Conquer, directed by Bonnie Kneen, is a favourite of last decade. Some Medieval and Renaissance plays were commissioned and performed for the South African Society of Medieval and Renaissance Studies’ international conferences, including The Second Shepherd's Pageant and Noah's Flood, Doctor Faustus by Marlowe, Everyman and Beaumont’s The Knight of the Burning Pestle. Last year,  Betrayal by Harold Pinter was acted in three different versions.



Betrayal
(Photos by Stephanie Carlsson and Heather McLachlan, 2010)

The Inklings’ productions give most members involved an opportunity to gain experience in a diverse number of related fields, including administration, front-of-house, back-stage, ticket sales, wardrobe, lighting and sound, besides writing, directing and acting. The society has also premiered a few plays written by members.



A number of  actors and writers who started out with the Inklings have gone on to make their mark in a bigger arena. Among them are Anton Robert Krueger, award-winning dramatist and novelist, now lecturing drama at Rhodes. Aside from starring in a number of Inklings productions, his In the Velvet City and In the Blue Beaker premiered with the Inklings. His plays have been staged in South Africa, as well as in England, Wales, Australia, the U.S.A., Monaco, Venezuela, Argentina and Chile. Anton’s Living in Strange Lands (also known as Tsafendas), a play about Hendrik Verwoerd's assassin Dimitri Tsafendas, was awarded a special trophy by the South African Community Theatre Association in 2001, and was nominated for South Africa’s highest stage award, the FNB/Vita prize. His most recent achievement is his novella Sunnyside Sal.

Other past members who have made a name for themselves include Annelize Nienaber, advocate and professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Pretoria, who has co-edited the book Plain language for a new democracy, and has published research related to a variety of human rights issues; the late Werner Viljoen, former Perdeby editor, who worked for CODESA; Sarel van Vuuren, whose voice, reporting for SABC news is familiar to all; Stephen Naudé, Managing Director at Pearson Education; Elizabeth le Roux, formerly of the Africa Institute and Unisa Press; Adalbert Ernst, Cape Town anaesthetist, and many more.

The acting experience gained with the Inklings has inspired some to take this pastime more seriously: Stewart Clegg is now acting professionally in the UK, Danie Struwig has also gone professional, and Peter Hubbard, who has had several lead roles in Inkling productions, now acts in his spare time for two amateur production companies in Amsterdam, one of which, the Queen's English Theatre Company, has produced The History Boys in Amsterdam and in Edinburgh during the Fringe Festival in August 2010.  



The Inklings' social events are always based on a literary theme. Events include picnics and dinner parties, such as a white picnic at the Union Buildings, a Shakespeare in Love Valentine's dinner, a Great Gatsby dinner party, a Narnia ‘kid’s’ luncheon and a 1950’s party. During such okkasies, members dress according to the theme, indulge in a delicious, theme-based, home-cooked meal and appreciate like-minded company. One the society's great strengths – its most enriching privilege –is that everybody in it values intellect without any airs, quirkiness and eccentricity without pretentiousness. It is a place where people with brains can be themselves and be liked for it!

  



1920s Jazz Party
(Photo by Andrea Vermaak, 2010)



The Inklings wish to continue their tradition of promoting arts and culture in the spirit of friendship and fun, giving anyone who is interested a chance to express him- or herself through writing or performing arts, and gain experience in various related fields without any pressure. Although the Inklings may be a small group of mostly UP students, it is an essential group which contributes much to academics, literature and stage in South Africa, with friendships and abiding ties that last long after its members leave university.



Anyone who has a great appreciation for the literary arts and loves to indulge in its beauty as an art form is welcome to join the Inklings. UP students may register as members, while members of the public are also welcome to get involved in the fun and support the society.

Join the Inklings’ Facebook page to keep up-to-date with news, socials events, creative writing workshops and productions: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_2262130317

Words by Andrea Vermaak and Idette Noomé