C J Driver

C.J. Driver, always known as Jonty, was born in Cape Town in 1939. He was President of the anti-apartheid National Union of South African Students in 1963-4, and during that time was detained in solitary confinement by the security police. The renewal of his passport was refused when he was at Oxford in 1967. He became stateless for five years. His first two novels were banned in South Africa and, even after becoming a British citizen, he was refused permission to visit his home country until...See more

C.J. Driver, always known as Jonty, was born in Cape Town in 1939. He was President of the anti-apartheid National Union of South African Students in 1963-4, and during that time was detained in solitary confinement by the security police. The renewal of his passport was refused when he was at Oxford in 1967. He became stateless for five years. His first two novels were banned in South Africa and, even after becoming a British citizen, he was refused permission to visit his home country until after the end of apartheid. Driver has been a productive and increasingly celebrated writer, publishing five novels, two biographies, two memoirs and twelve collections or booklets of poems. He was a teacher for many years, in Africa, Hong Kong, India and England, latterly a headmaster. Since his retirement from teaching in 2000, he has been a fulltime writer. He lives with his wife in East Sussex, England. See less