Author | Jani Allan |
---|---|
Cover artist | Roger Ingarfield |
Country | South Africa |
Language | English |
Genre | Journalism/Photography |
Publisher | Longstreet |
Publication date | 1983 |
Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
Pages | 119 |
ISBN | 978-0-620-07013-3 |
OCLC | 53125911 |
Followed by | Jani Confidential |
Face Value is a 1983 anthology of collected journalism by South African journalist Jani Allan. The book is compiled from selections of Allan's successful [1] gossip and popular culture column Just Jani that appeared in the Sunday Times . She was voted "the most admired person in South Africa." in a Gallup poll commissioned by the newspaper. [2] The book was published by Longstreet publishers in Cape Town and released in South Africa in 1983. [3]
The book is a selection of interviews and photographs of public figures from various fields such as entertainment, sport, business, art and politics. Allan also contributed a column-style introduction to each chapter. Andrzej Sawa provided the photographs of the interviewees. [3] [4]
Five of the interviewees (Sol Kerzner, Danie Craven, Pieter-Dirk Uys, Walter Battiss and Taubie Kushlick) were featured in the They shaped our century survey, a top 100 list published about which people had the greatest influence on South Africa during the twentieth century. Sunday Times editor, Tertius Myburgh wrote a foreword for the collection.
"I do not think that for one moment that in a brief interview I can write an accurate-every-time character-revealing piece. But my aim has always been to convey as honestly as I can my first impressions on Face Value, with no 'Ums', 'Ers' or retakes." [3]
The book received favourable reviews; [3]
"She soon developed a highly individual style and the Jani Allan column, one of the most successful features in Africa's biggest newspaper, followed. She's become a formidable journalist...There's a touch of Tom Wolfe's 'new journalism' about her writing, but it is never contrived. In her choice of subjects she's attracted by what she calls 'the boquet of money' and she's good on those ubiquitous creatures of our time, the 'celebrities', whom she is able to send up without the bitchiness which tends to put me off some lady writers of the adversary school of journalism. When she's touched by something - an individual, a cause, or some little act of valour - her writing reflects immense warmth and humanity." Tertius Myburgh, Editor of the Sunday Times
"Your piece on me acted like a bicycle pump and I mooned around for ages, smiling foolishly and cannoning off the wallls. [sic]" Frank Muir
"The only girl who ever knocked me out" Mike Weaver
"Guy Fawkes couldn't brighten up Sunday better." Graham Bell
"She is not destructive - but she does have a particular facility for puncturing pomposity" Joe Sutton
This section may need to be rewritten to comply with Wikipedia's quality standards, as it uses pseudo-headings and misuses boldface in accordance with the manual of style.(April 2023) |
THE PERPETUAL SPECTACLES 9
BUSINESS MORE THAN USUAL 21
NATIONAL MONUMENTS 37
PRETTY BOYS ALL IN A ROW 57
FUNNY YOU SHOULD SAY THAT ... 67
SPORTING CHANCERS 79
OLD MASTERS, YOUNG IDEAS 89
MIXED METAPHORS 101
Her Just Jani column has been referenced extensively by South African English dictionaries because of Allan's popular use of terms such as jorl, smaak and larney . [17]
Jacobus Johannes Uys, better known as Jamie Uys, was a South African film director, best known for directing the 1980 comedy film The Gods Must Be Crazy and its 1989 sequel The Gods Must Be Crazy II. Uys also directed the 1974 documentary film Animals Are Beautiful People.
Pieter-Dirk Uys is a South African performer, author, satirist, and social activist. One of his best known roles is as Evita Bezuidenhout, an Afrikaner socialite.
Anneline Kriel is a South African actress, model and beauty pageant titleholder who won Miss South Africa 1974 and was later crowned Miss World 1974. She is the second of three South African women to hold the Miss World title after Penelope Coelen in 1958 and before Rolene Strauss in 2014. In South Africa she achieved "icon" status where she became known as a "Princess Diana" figure and also appeared in several local film and television projects such as Kill and Kill Again in 1981. She was also in a high-profile marriage (1980-1985) with the late South African hotelier, Sol Kerzner.
Walter Whall Battiss was a South African artist, also known as the creator of the "Fook Island" concept.
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Jani Allan was a South African journalist, columnist, writer, broadcaster, and a media celebrity.
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Red Jacket is a 1998 documentary film about the life of the world's best-selling artist, Vladimir Tretchikoff. The film was produced by Technitronics and televised by the SABC.
Andrzej Sawa is a Polish-South African photographer.
Sonja Herholdt is a South African singer-songwriter and Afrikaner actress.
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Jani Confidential is a memoir by the late South African columnist Jani Allan, once the most famous media figure in the country as a columnist for the country's mass-circulation Sunday Times. Allan charts her rise in South African journalism against the backdrop of excess and decadence of the country's white elites. Allan's life unravels when an interview with the late Eugene Terre'Blanche threatens to derail her glittering career. Her memoir became a critical success, lauded by publications such as the Daily Maverick, Mail & Guardian and Noseweek. Commercially Jani Confidential also performed well, becoming a Sunday Times top five best-seller. The memoir was published by Jacana Media on 16 March 2015.
John Matisonn is a South African political journalist and author. He was one of the founding councillors of South Africa's Independent Broadcasting Authority and from 1986 to 1991 was the South Africa correspondent for National Public Radio in the United States.
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