Anton Krueger

Head of Department

Position: Associate Professor

BA (Hons) University of Pretoria, MA (Philosophy of Literature, UNISA), DLitt (University of Pretoria)

Email: a.krueger@ru.ac.za

Tel: 046 603 8976

 

Teaching and Research Interests:

Representations of consciousness, artificial intelligence and spirituality in literature, memoir, performance poetry, orality and spontaneous creation. 

 

Overview:

Anton Krueger is a writer and scholar specialising in South African literary and performing arts. He is an NRF rated researcher and has published 27 scholarly articles and over one hundred reviews on subjects ranging from indigenous dance to the role of Mindfulness in Creativity.

 

His book Experiments in Freedom: Issues of Identity in New South African Drama (2010) won the Rhodes Vice-Chancellor’s Book Award and Magnet Theatre: Three Decades of Making Space (2016, co-edited with Megan Lewis) won the Hiddingh-Currie Award.

 

He is on the editorial board for the Methuen / Bloomsbury series Agitations: Texts, Politics and Performance and in 2021 was the Guest Editor of a Special Issue on Improvisation for the Performance and Mindfulness Journal.

 

He’s also reviewed theatre and literature for a number of media outlets, including the Daily Maverick, Mail and Guardian, Sunday Independent, Business Day and The Sunday Times. Anton’s reviews were awarded a Silver Medal from BASA for Arts Journalism in 2017 and in 2019 he was invited to be an Associate Curator for the Theatre and Live Art selection for the main programme of the National Arts Festival.

 

Creative Writing:

Anton has published in a wide range of literary genres, including poetry, memoir, short fiction and drama. His plays have been performed in many different countries and he’s been awarded numerous prizes in different fields, including a nomination for an FNB Vita and runner up for the Olive Schreiner Drama award for Living in Strange Lands: The Testimony of Tsafendas (2001, 2009). Mediocrity was the winner of the SANCTA festival and the play was chosen to represent South Africa at the Mondial du Teater in Monaco in 2001. In 2007, Chatter won the PANSA Gauteng Festival of Staged Reading.

 

He was invited to participate in Poetry Africa in 2008 and 2023, and was the runner up for the Dalro Poetry prize, for “Nine Notes on Lisbon” (2011). An Afrikaans radio Drama, Altyd was shortlisted for the RSG Sanlam award and broadcast in 2013. Old Dogs was awarded staged readings in Durban and Cape Town.

 

In 2016, the comedy story “Jim Goes to Durban” (co-written with Pravasan Pillay) was shortlisted for Short, Sharp Stories and received a “Highly Commended” by the judges. Anton's first novel The University Currently Known As… was longlisted for the Dinaane Debut Fiction Award in 2018. In the same year, his radio drama Easter Island was shortlisted out of 1000 entries for the BBC World Drama award and was broadcast on SAFM.

 

Strange Land (a reworking of Living in Strange Lands) played at the Market Theatre in 2019 and was nominated for a Naledi Award for Best Script. In 2020, Anton presented his solo show The Voice in Your Head on the Main Programme of the Virtual National Arts Festival.

 

In 2021, Anton performed alongside the HA!Man (Francois le Roux) in Fearless Flow… on the Main programme of the NAF, combining music and improvisation. In 2023 his new book of poems, Everybody is a Bridge, was performed in Makhanda, Bathurst and Durban to music improvised by a range of musicians, including jazz legends Paul Hanmer and Rick van Heerden.

 

Books (Criticism):

2016: Magnet Theatre: Thirty Years of Making Space. London: Intellect & Pretoria: Unisa Press. (Co-editor with Megan Lewis) [WINNER OF THE HIDDINGH-CURIE AWARD, 2017]

2010: Experiments in Freedom: Explorations of Identity in New South African Drama. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press. [WINNER OF THE RHODES VICE CHANCELLOR’S BOOK AWARD, 2011]

 

Books (Other):

2023: Everybody is a Bridge. Johannesburg: Botsotso. (Poetry)

2019: Die Oog, with Eben Viktor. Cape Town: Naledi. (Novel, Afrikaans)

2012: Chatter. Lombardy East: Off the Wall. (Drama)

2011: Everyday Anomalies. Grahamstown: Aerial. (Poetry).

2011: Shaggy.  Pretoria: BK Publishing. Reprinted 2013. (Short Stories, with Pravasan Pillay).

2010: Sunnyside Sal. Grahamstown: Deep South. (Memoir)

2007: Axis. London: Stagescripts. (Drama)

2003: Living in Strange Lands: The Testimony of Tsafendas. New York: Playscripts. (Docu-Drama)

2002: Mediocrity. London: UK Plays & Musicals. (Drama – 1 Act)

2002: Vanessa & the Vanguard. London: UK Plays & Musicals. (Drama – 1 Act)

2002: The Velvet City. London: UK Plays & Musicals. (Drama – 1 Act)

2001: In the Blue Beaker – a Comedy about Suicide. New York: Playscripts. (Drama – 1 Act)

 

Book chapters:

2024: Inter-Acting in Online Spaces – South African Virtual National Arts Festivals (2021-2022) IN Routledge Handbook on African Theatre and Performance (Edited by Kene Igweonu). London: Routledge.

2019: Revolutionary Trends at the South African National Arts Festival, IN The Routledge Companion to Theatre and Politics, (Edited by Helena Grehan and Peter Eckersall). New York: Routledge.

2016: (with Megan Lewis) Introduction. IN Magnet Theatre: Thirty Years of Making Space. (Edited by Anton Krueger and Megan Lewis). London: Intellect / Pretoria: Unisa

2016: The Implacable Grandeur of the Stranger: Ruminations on Fear and Familiarity in Magnet Theatre's Die Vreemdeling [The Stranger]. IN Magnet Theatre: Thirty Years of making Space. London & Pretoria: Intellect & Unisa Press.^[1]

2015/2016: Reza de Wet. IN Methuen Drama Guide to Contemporary South African Drama. Edited by Greg Homann. London: Methuen.

2015: Spectacles of Participation, Performing amaXhosa Authenticity at the National Arts Festival of South Africa. IN New Territories: Theatre, Drama and Performance in Post-Apartheid South Africa. Edited by Greg Homann and Mark Maufort. Brussels: Peter Lang.

2014: “It’s Just Changed Color?”: Clowning with Parodies of Religion, Race and Nation in Woza Albert! and Woza Andries?” IN Theatre and National identity Ed. Nadine Holdsworth. London: Routledge.

2014: A Heritage of Violence: Paradoxes of Freedom and Memory in Recent South African Play Texts, IN Syncretic Arenas: Essays on Postcolonial Drama and Theatre for Esiaba Irobi. Ed. Isidore Diala. Rodopi: Amsterdam.

2013: Zef / Poor White Kitsch Chique: South African Comedies of Degradation. In: Performative Inter-Actions in African Theatre 1: Innovation, Creativity & Social Change. Editors: Kene Igweonu & Osita Okagbue. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press.^[2]

2010: Celebrations of the Spirit of Tragedy – The Dionysian Theatre of Brett Bailey. In Positionen. (Edited by Matthew Krouse, Published in English (Johannesburg: Jacana) and German (Hamburg: Steidl).

 

Journal articles:

2021: Editorial: Special Issue on Improvisation. Journal of Performance and Mindfulness. 4 (1). p.1-10.

2019: Betty, Zorg and Me – Sex, Freedom, Art.  English Studies in Africa. 62 (1): 81-89.

2018: Revolutionary Trends at the National Arts Festival 2017 (an overview). South African Theatre Journal. 31 (2-3): 202-210.

2017: Performing Mindful Creativity: Three South African Case Studies in Performance and Mindfulness Journal (1).

2015: Whose Voice is it Anyway? Implications of Free Writing. Current Writing: Text and Reception in Southern Africa. Special Issue on Creative Writing 27(2):103-110.

2013: The Implacable Grandeur of the Stranger: Ruminations on Fear and Familiarity in Die Vreemdeling. South African Theatre Journal. 26 (3): 303-310.

2012: Die Moderne Self as Toneelpop in Woyzeck on the Highveld” Literator. 32 (2)

2012: Zef / Poor White Kitsch Chique: Die Antwoord’s Comedy of Degradation. In: Safuni 13 (3-4): 399-408.

2011: The Failure of Masculinity in Fugard’s Recent Work. South African Theatre Journal 25 (2).

2010: Keeping it in the Family: Incest, Repression and the Fear of the Hybrid in Reza de Wet's English Plays Literator 31 (3).

2010: Fashionably Ethnic: Individuality and Heritage in Greig Coetzee's Happy Natives. Current Writing 22 (1).

2007: Performing Transformations of Identity – ‘Ethnic’ Nationalisms and Syncretic Theatre in Post-Apartheid South Africa. The English Academy Review. vol. 24 (1). (51-60).

2006: (with Clare Stopford). Intuition / Intellect – Sex / Sensibility South African Theatre Journal. vol. 20. (233-251).

2004: Three Men, Three Manifestoes: Comparing Criteria Demanded by Wilde, Hemingway and Kerouac in light of Lyotard's Critique of Legitimation. Proceedings of the 14th International English Academy Conference: "Mother tongue, Other tongue? Law Learning and Literature. Pretoria: University of Pretoria Press.

2003: The Drama of Hunting and Healing: Interpreting the Rituals of the San. South African Theatre Journal. vol. 17. (65-78).

2003: Cultures of Change: Challenges in Mapping Revolutionary Literary Eras. In Modern Perspectives and Views on European Literature. Beijing: Chinese Ethnic Press.

2000: Imprisoned by Conviction. Scrutiny 2, vol. 5 (2). (59-62).

 

Reviews and interviews in journals:

2019: Woza Albert! (student editions). South African Theatre Journal, 32 (3):342-344.

2017: Reader in Comedy: An Anthology of Theory and Criticism, South African Theatre Journal. 30 (1-3).

2015: Interweaving Performance Cultures, South African Theatre Journal 28(1). 

2013: Gazing at Exhibit A: An interview with Brett Bailey. Liminalities 9 (1).

2012: The Pump Room. In South African Theatre Journal.  26 (1).

2010: What is a Puppet? A review of Handspring Puppet, published by David Krut. in De Artes.

2010: Identity and Failure: An Interview between Ashraf Jamal and Anton Krueger. Scrutiny2: Issues in English Studies. (2).

2006: On the Wild, Essential Energies of the Forest: An Interview with Brett Bailey South African Theatre Journal. vol. 20. (323-332).

2006: On Being Bad: a Review of Laduma by A.K. Thembeka. Scrutiny 2:  vol. 11 (1). (143-144).

2003: Theatre in South Africa – ‘an endangered species’: interview with Anthony Akerman. Scrutiny 2, vol. 8 (2). (60-65).

 

Recent reviews in media:

2023: Trauma and intimacy at the National Arts Festival. Daily Maverick. 5 July.

2019: So much deliciousness: an overview of the 2019 National Arts Festival Business Day,  28 June.

 

Last Modified: Sat, 20 Jan 2024 12:09:54 SAST