Parables and Poems

Parables and Poems is an anthology of short works, some of which are featured in other books by Pat Stevens, but are included here to reinforce various points of view. The piece's range from brief humorous essays to longer satirical articles, covering a wide spectrum of problems, but concentrating mainly on Southern Africa. The author has attempted to sequence the articles, so the content of each compliments the previous, in order to create an interlinking theme. Included are eight of the authors poems, and a list of favourite books both local and international, that have strongly influenced his writing. Then comes a light-hearted thrust at South African sport, which due to the interference of the liberal press is a heavy-hearted subject, Protea cricket is a tragic example of this. The liberals insisted on dropping the Springbok emblem, since then cricket and the pretty flower have never won a world cup, while the rugby Springboks have won two. Scrapping the death penalty and introducing criminal friendly laws, are more serious examples of liberal interference that bedevils South Africa, which turned the country into a crime hellhole. The liberals are savagely satirized throughout the book, especially in four amusing allegories, which mock the liberal penchant for social control. The book finishes with a section that poses the question, could a worthwhile meaning to life be a dedicated mission to annihilate neoliberalism, that certainly is the Holy Grail quest of author Pat Stevens. Forcefully expressed in his novel Zulu Vampire, where the South African press are taken to task, for their twenty year persecution of Jacob Zuma. Then in the comic fantasy The Old Farts vs The Fatberg, the UK press are savagely satirised, for elevating Boris Johnson to Prime Minister.