Dylan McGarry – författare

Evil stalks the township of KwaMashu, near Durban. It comes in the form of Whoonga, a toxic mix of B-grade heroin, rat poison and other chemical components that almost immediately sucks its users into the vortex of addiction and the crime, deception and personal tragedy that goes with it. Caught up in the web, the ulwembu of the title, presided over by the dealer, Bongani Mseleku, are Lieutenant Portia Mthembu, a police officer in the frontline of the fight against the scourge; her son Sipho; his friend, Andile Nxumalo, and Emmanuel Abreu, a Mozambique-born spaza shopkeeper. As it traces Sipho’s descent from talented scholar and aspirant poet and songwriter to suicidal addict, Ulwembu explores the effects of addiction not only on those who suffer from it but on communities, families and the police, both those who try to control the murderous trade and those who benefit from it. Using a process they have dubbed Empatheatre, The Big Brotherhood, Neil Coppen, Dylan McGarry and Mpume Mtombeni, aim to share ‘people’s real-life stories, with the intention to inspire and develop a greater empathy and kindness in spaces where there is conflict or injustice’. Ulwembu is the dramatic result of their efforts.

Evil stalks the township of KwaMashu, near Durban. It comes in the form of Whoonga, a toxic mix of B-grade heroin, rat poison and other chemical components that almost immediately sucks its users into the vortex of addiction and the crime, deception and personal tragedy that goes with it. Caught up in the web, the ulwembu of the title, presided over by the dealer, Bongani Mseleku, are Lieutenant Portia Mthembu, a police officer in the frontline of the fight against the scourge; her son Sipho; his friend, Andile Nxumalo, and Emmanuel Abreu, a Mozambique-born spaza shopkeeper. As it traces Sipho’s descent from talented scholar and aspirant poet and songwriter to suicidal addict, Ulwembu explores the effects of addiction not only on those who suffer from it but on communities, families and the police, both those who try to control the murderous trade and those who benefit from it. Using a process they have dubbed Empatheatre, The Big Brotherhood, Neil Coppen, Dylan McGarry and Mpume Mtombeni, aim to share ‘people’s real-life stories, with the intention to inspire and develop a greater empathy and kindness in spaces where there is conflict or injustice’. Ulwembu is the dramatic result of their efforts.

The 21st century looks quite different in reality to the predictions made by science fiction writers. Instead of a world dominated by flying cars and androids, we have found ourselves living in the wake of a global pandemic, experiencing an increasing frequency of natural disasters, battling political turmoil and global refugee crises, all set against the backdrop of the climate emergency and the mass extinction of species, including, eventually, our own. Meanwhile, we send off our kids to school to prepare them for a future that we as grown-ups increasingly come to fear. In this setting, what is the role of education at the potential end of the world? What societal as well as personal role does education play when our hopes for the future may need to be drastically readjusted?Education at the End of Time addresses these questions and explores the role of education in current society not in a limited sense of formal schooling, but rather in terms of what it means to live and engage with a world that is at the brink of collapse. Yet, it falls not into fatalism, but to account for a journey that leads to a (re)discovery of the world beyond the modern notion of development and personal realization. It offers an a journey to open up new perspectives for how to think of education as a way out of a path set towards the end of the world.

The 21st century looks quite different in reality to the predictions made by science fiction writers. Instead of a world dominated by flying cars and androids, we have found ourselves living in the wake of a global pandemic, experiencing an increasing frequency of natural disasters, battling political turmoil and global refugee crises, all set against the backdrop of the climate emergency and the mass extinction of species, including, eventually, our own. Meanwhile, we send off our kids to school to prepare them for a future that we as grown-ups increasingly come to fear. In this setting, what is the role of education at the potential end of the world? What societal as well as personal role does education play when our hopes for the future may need to be drastically readjusted?Education at the End of Time addresses these questions and explores the role of education in current society not in a limited sense of formal schooling, but rather in terms of what it means to live and engage with a world that is at the brink of collapse. Yet, it falls not into fatalism, but to account for a journey that leads to a (re)discovery of the world beyond the modern notion of development and personal realization. It offers an a journey to open up new perspectives for how to think of education as a way out of a path set towards the end of the world.