Jeremy Gordin – författare

High Times is the true story of Michael Medjuck, whose taste for weed, women and the good life led him from late-1960s Johannesburg to notoriety as one of the biggest hash and weed smugglers in North America.From his base in Vancouver, Michael built up a smuggling network that supplied dealers in scores of cities across Canada and the United States. The proceeds from smuggling afforded this former King David High School pupil a lifestyle of hedonistic excess – the finest wines, the most glamorous hookers, the best weed in the world.In 1991, Michael was nabbed by US federal agents while smuggling an enormous shipload of Afghani hash into the West Coast of Canada. Put on trial as the scheme''s mastermind, Michael was convicted and sentenced to 24 years behind bars.His prison experiences, from dingy county lock-ups to brutal federal penitentiaries, are the stuff of legend. Eventually, a chance remark to his lawyer led to his early release and return to Canada.After barely a year of freedom, Michael was again arrested – this time in Spain for an ill-judged cocaine smuggling venture – and sentenced to an additional prison term of nine years.This is Michael''s extraordinary story, as told to fellow South Africans Roy Isacowitz, author and journalist, and the late Jeremy Gordin, award-winning journalist, editor and author.

The New South African Review revives the tradition of critical, analytical scholarship developed by the South African Review in the 1970s and 1980s. Accessible to a wide readership and drawing upon authors from well beyond academia, its objective is to be informative, discursive and, at times, downright provocative. It seeks to provide contemporary comment and engage with current controversies. The first volume in the series, 2010: Development or Decline? ranges widely across the implications of the international crisis for the economy, the threats to our fragile ecology of present economic strategies, through to the state of the ANC and the public service, issues around service delivery, migration, HIV-Aids, land reform, crime, the sexual behaviour of our youth, and much more. Posing the provocative question of whether South Africa is embarking upon a long-term decline, the volume simultaneously argues the potential for a society premised upon social equality, social coherence and sustainability. This collection will appeal to both national and international audiences interested in engaging with the multiple dilemmas and challenges facing contemporary South Africa

The New South African Review revives the tradition of critical, analytical scholarship developed by the South African Review in the 1970s and 1980s. Accessible to a wide readership and drawing upon authors from well beyond academia, its objective is to be informative, discursive and, at times, downright provocative. It seeks to provide contemporary comment and engage with current controversies. The first volume in the series, 2010: Development or Decline? ranges widely across the implications of the international crisis for the economy, the threats to our fragile ecology of present economic strategies, through to the state of the ANC and the public service, issues around service delivery, migration, HIV-Aids, land reform, crime, the sexual behaviour of our youth, and much more. Posing the provocative question of whether South Africa is embarking upon a long-term decline, the volume simultaneously argues the potential for a society premised upon social equality, social coherence and sustainability. This collection will appeal to both national and international audiences interested in engaging with the multiple dilemmas and challenges facing contemporary South Africa