Gert Vlok Nel

Gert Vlok Nel was born in Beaufort West in 1963, studied English, Afrikaans and history at Stellenbosch University, and worked as a guide, a bartender and a watchman. His one collection of poems, Om te lewe is onnatuurlik, won the Ingrid Jonker Prize in 1994, and was followed by the CD Beaufort Wes se beautiful woorde and by a full-length show of poems, songs and visual material that he has performed all over South Africa. The poems draw a personal portrait of his childhood in Beaufort West, where his father was a railway employee, in an unusual and innovative Afrikaans of his own. He names Tom Waits and Bruce Springsteen as models — "Tom Waits, he messes about, just like me" — and his re-released album entered the Dutch charts at number 59 in 2006.