• Message from James Clarke













    "South Africa's Best Humour Columnist"
    - SA's Comedy Awards September 2008

    “South Africa’s funniest columnist.”
    - Financial Mail

    Please forgive the little boasts at the top of this column. You see I am not famous enough to be modest. And that second unsolicited quote comes from the literary critic of a rival group so who am I to argue anyway?

    Having said that, welcome to my blogsite! Please come in and close the door.
    Let me introduce myself: I was for 30 years a science writer on South Africa’s foremost daily newspaper, The Star, Johannesburg, dealing with environmental matters, urban and rural.

    Sixteen years ago The Star persuaded me to write a daily humour column. It's called Stoep Talk ( “Stoep” being a veranda in South Africa).

    I also write for various journals and have had several books published.

    I’m still not entirely sure what a blogsite is except it’s a sort of cross between a website and, I think, a Schnauzer and my friends insist I must have one.

    For some reason it is customary in blogsites and websites to refer to oneself in the third person and so, with my permission (thank you so much) I will, from now on, refer to myself as Clarke.

    You will find on this site some of my – sorry, I mean Clarke's - columns and also an idea of some of Clarke’s books and something about the fellow.

  • HOT OFF THE PRESS !!

















    James Clarke’s latest book, Blazing Saddles (Jonathan Ball publishers), is the hilarious story – a true adventure – involving six men in various stages of decrepitude who, on a sudden whim, decide to embark on a 1 000km cycle ride down the River Danube . None had cycled since childhood – nor even owned a bicycle.

    The story, reminiscent of Jerome K Jerome’s Three Men in a Boat – is told by their not terribly good leader, James Clarke.

    The ride which passed through four countries became known as the Tour de Farce.

    The Tour de Farce has since become an annual event and Blazing Saddles recounts the team’s adventures in France, Italy, Ireland and their ride from the source of the Thames, through the middle of London, down to the North Sea.

    Available from bookshops and Kalahari.net

Polly’s gone crackers

Posted on March 28, 2009 by James Clarke

A Chinese man walked into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The barman asked, “Where’d you get that?”
The parrot says: “In Asia there are MILLIONS of them!”
I am not sure why parrots feature so much in jokes but they do. Here are a few samples some of which you’ll know but a good [...]

Filed under: General | Leave a Comment »

What’s all this **** then?

Posted on March 26, 2009 by James Clarke

Not long ago there was a fairly well-founded  rumour that  Britain’s Royal Society for the Protection of Birds had banned the use of the word “cock” when meaning a male bird.  What had happened was this: an article had been published in one of its journals in which it censored the phrase “cock blackbird” replacing [...]

Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

How to be organised or otherwise

Posted on March 2, 2009 by James Clarke

You’d think I’d be organised by this stage in my life. After all, I’ve been in one occupation for half a century.
In fact the casual observer might assume that I am indeed organised. I have, arrayed in front of me, a fax machine; a busy body telephone that chats to people and takes messages; a [...]

Filed under: General | Leave a Comment »