Fools Other Stories

Ndebele evokes South African township life with humor and subtlety in this novel.

A modern fable about some peacocks and swans who allow the fear of their differences to become so great that they end up destroying each other.

Isaac Bashevis Singer' s first collection of stories, "Gimpel the Fool," is a landmark work that has attracted international acclaim since it was first published in 1957. In Saul Bellow' s masterly translation, the title story follows the exploits of Gimpel, an ingenuous baker who is universally deceived but who declines to retaliate against his tormentors. Gimpel and the protagonists of the other stories in this volume all inhabit the distinctive pre World War II ghettos of Poland and, beyond that, the larger world created by Singer' s unforgettable prose.

Fools and Other Stories is an intricate and subtle collection that deals with the formative experiences of growing up in a Johannesburg township during the apartheid years. ‘These five stories are part of a long project in which I am attempting to explore imaginatively various aspects of life in the community I grew up in in South Africa. The first part, which these five stories cover, deals with the themes of early childhood and adolescence. In the second part I hope to explore adult life up to old age; lastly, I want to imaginatively study the movement of social change.’ – Njabulo S. Ndebele

Ndebele evokes South African township life with humor and subtlety in this novel.