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Face Value (book)
Encyclopedia
Face Value is a book of collected journalism by South African journalist Jani Allan
. The book is compiled from selections of Allan's successful gossip and popular culture column Just Jani that appeared in the Sunday Times. She was voted "the most admired person in South Africa." in a Gallup poll commissioned by the newspaper. The book was published by Longstreet publishers in Cape Town
and released in South Africa in the 1980s.
provided the photographs of the interviewees.
Five of the interviewees (Sol Kerzner
, Danie Craven
, Pieter-Dirk Uys
, Walter Battiss
and Taubie Kushlick
) were featured in the They shaped our century
survey, a top 100 list published about which people had the greatest influence on South Africa during the twentieth century.
"She soon developed a highly individual style and the Jani Allan column, one of the most successful features in Africa's biggest newspaper, followed. She's become a formidable journalist...There's a touch of Tom Wolfe
's 'new journalism
' about her writing, but it is never contrived. In her choice of subjects she's attracted by what she calls 'the boquet of money' and she's good on those ubiquitous creatures of our time, the 'celebrities', whom she is able to send up without the bitchiness which tends to put me off some lady writers of the adversary school of journalism. When she's touched by something - an individual, a cause, or some little act of valour - her writing reflects immense warmth and humanity." Tertius Myburgh, Editor of the Sunday Times
"Your piece on me acted like a bicycle pump and I mooned around for ages, smiling foolishly and cannoning off the wallls." Frank Muir
"The only girl who ever knocked me out" Mike Weaver
"Guy Fawkes couldn't brighten up Sunday better." Graham Bell
"She is not destructive - but she does have a particular facility for puncturing pomposity" Joe Sutton
BUSINESS MORE THAN USUAL 21
NATIONAL MONUMENTS 37
PRETTY BOYS ALL IN A ROW 57
FUNNY YOU SHOULD SAY THAT ... 67
SPORTING CHANCERS 79
OLD MASTERS, YOUNG IDEAS 89
MIXED METAPHORS 101
dictionnaries because of Allan's popular use of terms such as jorl, smaak and larney
.
Jani Allan
Jani Allan is a South African columnist and radio commentator. She became a household name as a columnist for the Sunday Times where she worked between 1979-90. She is also known for her alleged affair with an interviewee, the late right-wing political leader Eugène Terre'Blanche...
. The book is compiled from selections of Allan's successful gossip and popular culture column Just Jani that appeared in the Sunday Times. She was voted "the most admired person in South Africa." in a Gallup poll commissioned by the newspaper. The book was published by Longstreet publishers in Cape Town
Cape Town
Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
and released in South Africa in the 1980s.
Synopsis
The book is a selection of interviews and photographs of public figures from various fields such as entertainment, sport, business, art and politics. Allan also contributed a column-style introduction to each chapter. Andrzej SawaAndrzej Sawa
-Early life:Sawa was born in a German labour camp in Poland in 1941 and lived there with his mother and grandmother until the end of the Second World War in 1945...
provided the photographs of the interviewees.
Five of the interviewees (Sol Kerzner
Sol Kerzner
Solomon Kerzner is a South African accountant and business magnate.-Background and career:Kerzner was born in Troyeville, Johannesburg, the youngest of four children to Jewish Russian immigrants...
, Danie Craven
Danie Craven
Daniël Hartman Craven , more famously known as Danie Craven or simply Doc Craven, is a former Western Province, Eastern Province, Northern Transvaal and Springbok rugby union player as well as arguably South Africa's best and best-known rugby administrator...
, Pieter-Dirk Uys
Pieter-Dirk Uys
Pieter-Dirk Uys is a South African satirist, active as a performer, author, and social activist. He is the son of a Calvinist Afrikaner father and Berlin-born Jewish mother and had an NG Kerk upbringing. He began his dramatic career as a serious playwright, switching to one-man revues at the...
, Walter Battiss
Walter Battiss
Walter Whall Battiss was a South African artist, generally considered the foremost South African abstract painter and known as the creator of the quirky "Fook Island" concept....
and Taubie Kushlick
Taubie Kushlick
Taubie Kushlick was a South African actress and producer. She became characterized as the self-styled "First Lady of Theatre".-Personal life and education:...
) were featured in the They shaped our century
They shaped our century
The They shaped our century survey was a top 100 list published in 1999 about which people had the greatest influence on South Africa during the twentieth century. The survey was run by South African media giant Media24 among users of its web portal. This survey preceded the SABC Great South...
survey, a top 100 list published about which people had the greatest influence on South Africa during the twentieth century.
Author's note
"I do not think that for one moment that in a brief interview I can write an accurate-every-time character-revealing piece. But my aim has always been to convey as honestly as I can my first impressions on FACE VALUE, with no 'Ums', 'Ers' or retakes."Reception
The book received favourable reviews;"She soon developed a highly individual style and the Jani Allan column, one of the most successful features in Africa's biggest newspaper, followed. She's become a formidable journalist...There's a touch of Tom Wolfe
Tom Wolfe
Thomas Kennerly "Tom" Wolfe, Jr. is a best-selling American author and journalist. He is one of the founders of the New Journalism movement of the 1960s and 1970s.-Early life and education:...
's 'new journalism
New Journalism
New Journalism was a style of 1960s and 1970s news writing and journalism which used literary techniques deemed unconventional at the time. The term was codified with its current meaning by Tom Wolfe in a 1973 collection of journalism articles he published as The New Journalism, which included...
' about her writing, but it is never contrived. In her choice of subjects she's attracted by what she calls 'the boquet of money' and she's good on those ubiquitous creatures of our time, the 'celebrities', whom she is able to send up without the bitchiness which tends to put me off some lady writers of the adversary school of journalism. When she's touched by something - an individual, a cause, or some little act of valour - her writing reflects immense warmth and humanity." Tertius Myburgh, Editor of the Sunday Times
"Your piece on me acted like a bicycle pump and I mooned around for ages, smiling foolishly and cannoning off the wallls." Frank Muir
Frank Muir
Frank Herbert Muir was an English comedy writer, radio and television personality, and raconteur. His writing and performing partnership with Denis Norden endured for most of their careers. Together they wrote BBC radio's Take It From Here for over 10 years, and then appeared on BBC radio...
"The only girl who ever knocked me out" Mike Weaver
"Guy Fawkes couldn't brighten up Sunday better." Graham Bell
Graham Bell (skier)
Graham Bell is a former professional skier and television pundit. Graham Bell was the younger of the two Bell brothers from Britain....
"She is not destructive - but she does have a particular facility for puncturing pomposity" Joe Sutton
Joe Sutton
Joe Sutton is an American playwright. He writes in the traditional Aristotelian style. He teaches Playwrighting at Dartmouth College.He is the son of actor Frank Sutton....
Contents
THE PERPETUAL SPECTACLES 9- Taubie KushlickTaubie KushlickTaubie Kushlick was a South African actress and producer. She became characterized as the self-styled "First Lady of Theatre".-Personal life and education:...
11 - Joan BrickhillJoan BrickhillJoan Brickhill is an award-winning South African actress who has worked in radio, theatre, television, and film. She is widely regarded as one of the most talented and respected South African actors of the twentieth century. Together with Louis Burke, Brickhill founded Brickhill-Burke...
& Louis Burke 13 - Moira ListerMoira ListerMoira Lister de Gachassin-Lafite, Vicomtesse d’Orthez was an Anglo-South African film, stage and television actress, and writer.-Early life:...
17 - Diane Todd 19
BUSINESS MORE THAN USUAL 21
- Sol KerznerSol KerznerSolomon Kerzner is a South African accountant and business magnate.-Background and career:Kerzner was born in Troyeville, Johannesburg, the youngest of four children to Jewish Russian immigrants...
22 - Benny Goldberg 26
- Mike Illion 29
- Tony Factor 33
NATIONAL MONUMENTS 37
- Dr Daniel Hartman CravenDanie CravenDaniël Hartman Craven , more famously known as Danie Craven or simply Doc Craven, is a former Western Province, Eastern Province, Northern Transvaal and Springbok rugby union player as well as arguably South Africa's best and best-known rugby administrator...
29 - Jamie UysJamie UysJacobus Johannes Uys , better known as Jamie Uys, was a South African film director.-Early life:Prior to his foray into film, Uys was a math teacher in his hometown of Boksburg. He then married Hettie, a fellow math teacher and the couple started farming and opening trading posts along the Palala...
41 - Siegfried MynhardtSiegfried Mynhardt-Personal life:Mynhardt was born in Johannesburg and lived in a Wynberg army camp, where his father was a padre. He had three children with his wife, Jocelyn.-Career:...
44 - Patrick MynhardtPatrick MynhardtPatrick Beattie Mynhardt was a well known South African film and theatre actor. He appeared in over 150 stage plays in South Africa and England, 100 local and international films, TV plays and serials as well as an opera...
47 - Joe Stewardson 51
- Sonja HerholdtSonja Herholdt-Personal life:Herholdt was born in the small Gauteng mining village of Nigel, Gauteng and at the age of three made her first singing performance at the local community recreation hall, singing the Afrikaans lullaby Slaap, my Kindjie....
53
PRETTY BOYS ALL IN A ROW 57
- Richard Loring 58
- Karl Kikillus 60
- James RyanJames Ryan (actor)-Career:In 1984, he appeared alongside Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep in the romantic-drama film, Falling in Love. He appeared in Five Corners alongside Jodie Foster and Tim Robbins, and stopped acting professionally in order to focus on writing and directing...
62
FUNNY YOU SHOULD SAY THAT ... 67
- Tobie Cronje 69
- Robert KirbyRobert Kirby (Satirist)Robert Kirby was a famous South African satirist, playwright, comedian, novelist, columnist and musician who died in 2007 following complications from a heart operation, some four months prior.-Career:...
70 - Katinka Heyns 72
- Pieter-Dirk UysPieter-Dirk UysPieter-Dirk Uys is a South African satirist, active as a performer, author, and social activist. He is the son of a Calvinist Afrikaner father and Berlin-born Jewish mother and had an NG Kerk upbringing. He began his dramatic career as a serious playwright, switching to one-man revues at the...
75
SPORTING CHANCERS 79
- Naas Botha 80
- Raymond Rhodes 83
- Wynand Classen 85
OLD MASTERS, YOUNG IDEAS 89
- Walter BattissWalter BattissWalter Whall Battiss was a South African artist, generally considered the foremost South African abstract painter and known as the creator of the quirky "Fook Island" concept....
90 - Gordon Vorster 93
- TretchikoffVladimir TretchikoffVladimir Grigoryevich Tretchikoff was one of the most commercially successful artists of all time - his painting Chinese Girl is one of the best selling art prints ever.Tretchikoff was a...
95
MIXED METAPHORS 101
- John Brett Cohen 103
- The Hell's AngelsHells AngelsThe Hells Angels Motorcycle Club is a worldwide one-percenter motorcycle gang and organized crime syndicate whose members typically ride Harley-Davidson motorcycles. In the United States and Canada, the Hells Angels are incorporated as the Hells Angels Motorcycle Corporation. Their primary motto...
105 - Alvon Collinson 109
- Gunter Brözel 111
- Robert Van TonderBoerestaat PartyThe Boerstaat Party is a right wing South African political party founded on September 30, 1986 by the late Robert van Tonder. It was never official because the required 500 persons under one roof could not be rallied. It was never represented in the South African Parliament, neither in the...
114 - Carole Charlewood 118
Dictionary
Her Just Jani column has been referenced extensively by South African EnglishSouth African English
The term South African English is applied to the first-language dialects of English spoken by South Africans, with the L1 English variety spoken by Zimbabweans, Zambians and Namibians, being recognised as offshoots.There is some social and regional variation within South African English...
dictionnaries because of Allan's popular use of terms such as jorl, smaak and larney
.