Judy Croome

Judy Croome is a South African novelist, short story writer, and poet. Born Judy Ann Heinemann on 16 December 1958 in Zvishavane, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), she received a Master of Arts (English) degree from the University of South Africa. She currently lives in Johannesburg. Croome was married to South African tax law scholar, Advocate of the High Court of South Africa and tax author, the late Dr Beric John Croome, who died in April 2019 after a long illness Quotes I think I fell into it. I wanted to write the next great novel. Of course, I think every writer wants to write the great novel. My personal circumstances were such that I didn’t have the time to dedicate [to writing]. My father was very ill. My mother needed help, she had a heart attack, my husband was with all sorts of things, so I was trying to balance all these things and I didn’t have time to do another novel. I thought, well, just write poems, at least you’re writing something. And somehow I discovered that I’m actually probably better at poems than I am at writing a novel because it suits my personality. The poem exists in and of itself, and its whole within itself, and I like that feeling of completeness when you finish the poem. That was when I realized I must focus on poetry, and that’s what I’ve done. That’s almost impossible to answer because there are so many poems that have moved me. As you grow as an individual, a poem that means something to you 10 years ago may have pushed you into a new experience, but when you look at it 10 years later, it doesn’t have the same resonance. The one that springs to mind now is “The Laughing Heart” by Charles Bukowski because it’s all about living life with passion and not letting the darkness of the world diminish you. “Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver is also a beautiful one. I love Toni Morrison’s style of writing. Although she’s talking about issues that are so important, she doesn’t do it from a role of victimhood, she does it from a role of power. She forces you into very uncomfortable – especially for me as a white South African – and really challenging things. That’s going back to what I was saying previously about how you want to change people by changing their perspectives. Works like Toni Morrison’s, Maya Angelou’s poems, Mary Oliver’s, Louise Erdrich’s novels, they inspire me by showing me different perspectives. They move me, they make me feel emotions, sometimes emotions that I don’t want to feel like guilt and shame. At the same time, it’s all part of human existence. If we don’t acknowledge those feelings, then we’re never going to move through them. We’re never going to change, we’re never going to grow. External links Category:Living people