Brent Meersman's guest appearances

Brent Meersman

Lunch with Pippa Hudson

Amabookabooka

Afternoon Drive with John Maytham

People of Note

Country Life

Nongcebo McKenzie: The Podcast

Nancy Richards

Deon Meyer

Sarah Boyd

John Allen

Nick Stadlen

Rusty Labuschagne

Andrew Newman

Kim Jordan

Johnny Clegg

Thomas Harding

Prue Leith

John Kani

Debbie Turner

Mark Anderson

Carol Campbell

OwlTail

Author Brent Meersman  is a guest on this episode of The Podcast. He shares with   Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie   his experience of growing up with a mother who has schizophrenia, which is the subject of his book 'A Childhood Made Up - Living With My Mother's Madness'.  "My mother's life was a constant battle with a tragic, debilitating mental condition, hardly understood in South Africa in the 1970s, even less so when she was first hospitalised in the 1950s in Valkenberg. She tried to have a normal life and, against her doctors' advice, proceeded to marry and have children, me being the youngest.There are possibly over 250,000 people with schizophrenia in South Africa. The number of family members affected is a great multiple of these. Yet stigma and silence pervade.A handful of people suffering from schizophrenia have penned their own stories, even fewer tell the story of growing up with a schizophrenic parent because of the difficulty of coming to terms with what is a very confusing experience for a child.I was also motivated by my deep irritation with how schizophrenia is more often than not grossly misrepresented in books and films, even highly acclaimed ones. Having had long discussions with my mother in her later life, I was able to draw on this intimate account of her psychotic experiences. I also had her letters and diaries and her paintings. She was a talented artist.Faced by such a daunting task, I first wrote A Childhood Made Up as a novel, referring to myself in the third person. It was an extremely fast-paced, almost manic book and darkly comic; someone compared its style to Kurt Vonnegut. I'm rather fond of it. Having completed the novel version, I was ready to confront my past more directly.The role of a writer in society is to articulate things we have all felt and done but which we have not articulated yet for ourselves or would prefer not to own up to in public.I learnt a great deal writing this book and I wish such a memoir had been available to me when I was growing up struggling to understand my mother and what was happening to our family.We are all a little bit mad and there is much reason and truth in madness too. As psychoanalyst Christopher Bollas puts it: schizophrenia can be seen "as an understandable way of responding to our precariousness in a highly unpredictable world".I hope this book does much more than entertain, move and sometimes amuse readers, but is a testament to a brave and talented and often misunderstood woman, my mother."Source : Sunday Times (12/04/2020)Technical Editing : Sibusiso 'Dust' NkosiStudio: United Rhythms StudioHost: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

Author <a href="http://meersman.co.za/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Brent Meersman</a>  is a guest on this episode of The Podcast. He shares with   <a href="https://nvmckenzie.co.za/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie </a>  his experience of growing up with a mother who has schizophrenia, which is the subject of his book 'A Childhood Made Up - Living With My Mother's Madness'.   "My mother's life was a constant battle with a tragic, debilitating mental condition, hardly understood in South Africa in the 1970s, even less so when she was first hospitalised in the 1950s in Valkenberg. She tried to have a normal life and, against her doctors' advice, proceeded to marry and have children, me being the youngest. There are possibly over 250,000 people with schizophrenia in South Africa. The number of family members affected is a great multiple of these. Yet stigma and silence pervade. A handful of people suffering from schizophrenia have penned their own stories, even fewer tell the story of growing up with a schizophrenic parent because of the difficulty of coming to terms with what is a very confusing experience for a child. I was also motivated by my deep irritation with how schizophrenia is more often than not grossly misrepresented in books and films, even highly acclaimed ones. Having had long discussions with my mother in her later life, I was able to draw on this intimate account of her psychotic experiences. I also had her letters and diaries and her paintings. She was a talented artist. Faced by such a daunting task, I first wrote A Childhood Made Up as a novel, referring to myself in the third person. It was an extremely fast-paced, almost manic book and darkly comic; someone compared its style to Kurt Vonnegut. I'm rather fond of it. Having completed the novel version, I was ready to confront my past more directly. The role of a writer in society is to articulate things we have all felt and done but which we have not articulated yet for ourselves or would prefer not to own up to in public. I learnt a great deal writing this book and I wish such a memoir had been available to me when I was growing up struggling to understand my mother and what was happening to our family. We are all a little bit mad and there is much reason and truth in madness too. As psychoanalyst Christopher Bollas puts it: schizophrenia can be seen "as an understandable way of responding to our precariousness in a highly unpredictable world". I hope this book does much more than entertain, move and sometimes amuse readers, but is a testament to a brave and talented and often misunderstood woman, my mother." Source : Sunday Times (12/04/2020) Technical Editing : Sibusiso 'Dust' Nkosi Studio: United Rhythms Studio Host: Nongcebo Vukile McKenzie

A Childhood Made Up - Living With My Mother's Madness with Brent Meersman

Rodney Trudgeon’s guest on People of Note this week is the author and journalist BRENT MEERSMAN. Brent is also co-editor of the news organisation Ground Up and his work has been published internationally. One of his latest books is called A Childhood Made UP – Living with my mother’s madness. The book has been described by Zapiro as “cathartic, insightful, funny and most of all, courageous” as it traces his mother’s battle with schizophrenia and his father’s alcohol-fuelled depression.

People of Note - Brent Meersman

Nancy Richards chats to author Brent Meersman on the subject of his new novel "A childhood made up: Living with my mother's madness". 

Nancy Richards chats to author Brent Meersman on the subject of his new novel "A childhood made up: Living with my mother's madness".

Country Life Podcast: Brent Meersman