Getting Up: Thoughts on Falling

David — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 04:47:21 GMT

Collections of writing are odd beasts. Once never really knows how to name them or hold them down exactly. Collections like this one by Andrew Miller are even odder as it combines searingly autobiographical material with political diatribe and satire.

“Getting Up: Thoughts on Falling” is a collection of essays from JHB based writer, Andrew Miller. Andrew has been a writer for a very long time. He is well respected as a poet, and as an essayist with some astute views. He also works very hard uplifting artistic communities and artists. He also suffers from Spinal Muscular Atrophy, Type II.

Andrew’s stories and recollections of his childhood, the progression of his disease and the mental/emotional journey it has taken him on are open, sincere and devastating. At no stage are they whiney, self pitying or even vague. He just talks you through it. It is YOU the reader that freaks out.

And then, on the next page, a calm discourse on politics, global zeitgeist, whatever. This roller coaster through the book tears your heart and mind one way and then the next, and you are left wondering if THIS is what it is like in Miller’s head as intellectual preoccupation battle for head-space in the midst of a debilitating disease that is very reluctant to surrender centre stage.

This is not a comfortable read. Even the politics are of the "make you think" variety. Miller even scratches around in history looking for the British roots of the apartheid ideology (and finds them). His style is like a well washed window… clear and simple, although you are sometimes not sure if you are seeing more of your own reflection than what lies beyond.

If books are to be judged by the impact they have on your way of thinking, this is a great book indeed. The best part about this impact is that it is not, as you might assume, due to any empathy that we might develop with Miller due to his illness. Rather it is because we can be shamed by our own lack of bravery, intellectual rigour and willingness to contemplate alternatives.

But if a book is to be judged on how good it makes you feel, then it fails horribly. Or does it? Does not the sheer human scale of determination and will inspire and exalt through the pages of pain and confusion? That may well depend on your own disposition.

Getting Up in then end would seem to exhort all of us to do just that. As a nation, as human beings. The only alternative is to stay fallen down…

You can buy this remarkable book online by clicking here.

The Chiz : Andrew Miller

Getting Up: Thoughts on Falling