10 minutes with South African writer Marlene Van Niekerk

Marlene is a South African poet, critic, novelist and dramatist. After stints in Mainz, Stuttgart and Amsterdam, she returned to South Africa where she is a professor of philosophy and literature. In 2013, Marlene’s controversial poem, Mud School, about the provision of schools in South Africa, provoked an angry response from the country’s government. Her work includes three collections of poetry, two collections of short stories and three novels. Her fiction has been translated widely.