Just as South Africans were starting to come to grips with the staggering cost of state capture, the Bosasa bombshell hit the country. This grand-scale corruption scandal cost South Africa billions of rands while the politicians involved were bought for as little as braai packs and booze.

While investigating state capture, The Zondo commission of inquiry blew the lid off the tangled web of bribery that was Bosasa. Gripping testimony before the commission about “little black books”, cash bribes and walk-in vaults held the public in thrall while a new realisation dawned: The notorious Gupta family had not been the only ones pillaging the country. In The Bosasa Billions, best-selling author James-Brent Styan and co-writer Paul Vecchiatto uncover the sordid story of how one company exploited the greed of corrupt politicians and bureaucrats to establish an extensive tender network stretching right to the top of the ANC government.

Its cast of characters include:

• Angelo Agrizzi, the whistleblower who makes new revelations to Styan about the secrets behind Bosasa’s glittering profit margins
• Vernie Petersen, the prisons boss who waged a lonely battle against the dark forces taking over his department, and
• Gavin Watson, the ultra-religious Bosasa puppet master who parlayed his family’s struggle credentials into vast wealth while leading his employees in prayer every morning.

Ultimately, however, Bosasa was not in the business of saving souls, but selling them.

Vir die vroue wat hy met sy rolprentsterglimlag betower het, was Chris Barnard ’n hartebreker. Vir sy pasiënte ’n harteheler.

Dié nuwe biografie oor Suid-Afrika se beroemdste hartsjirurg vertel nie net van Barnard se kinderjare in Beaufort-Wes, sy prominente huwelike (en egskeidings) en flambojante lewe nie. James Styan ondersoek ook die impak van die historiese eerste hartoorplanting op Barnard se persoonlik lewe en op die Suid-Afrikaanse gemeenskap in die algemeen, waar apartheidswetgewing dikwels die probleme van geneeskunde nog ingewikkelder gemaak het. Die rol van swart mediese personeel soos Hamilton Naki word bespreek, sowel as die intense wedywering wat tussen ander beroemde hartsjirurge en Barnard ontstaan het.

Hoe het Barnard dit reggekry om hulle almal in dié resies om lewe en dood te wen? Hoeveel het sy welbekende sjarme daarmee te doen gehad? En wat is Barnard se nalatenskap vandag, in die lig van sy latere suksesse en aansienlike mislukkings? Styan dek dit alles in dié fassinerende nuwe blik op Chris Barnard wat uitgegee is om saam te val met die 50ste herdenking van die eerste hartoorplanting.

In 2018 the world watched as 82 per cent of all wealth created was claimed by the top 1 per cent of the global population. The bottom 50 per cent of humanity saw no increase at all. While one new billionaire was created every two days, one in every four South Africans were living on less than R18 per day – not enough to buy a loaf of bread.

Inequality has always been part of the world we live in, but in the past twenty years the situation has worsened. We have seen the rise of mega corporations, where regional companies have become global players: power brokers that are richer and more powerful than most countries. This has seen businesses record ever-increasing profits while they pay ever-decreasing taxes. How is this happening?

In South Africa, millions of people depend on the services and products of mega corporations, but to what extent do these corporations influence and affect the lives of their consumers? What do these companies do with all the power that is in their hands?

In The Dirty Secrets of the Rich and Powerful, James-Brent Styan casts the spotlight on economic inequality and unpacks historical and ongoing business practices that have a real influence on people today. This book takes you right into the corridors of power and behind the closed doors of the boardrooms of the rich and powerful to show you how, and why, the status quo seems so unfair.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

In teaching linear statistical models to first-year graduate students or to final-year undergraduate students there is no way to proceed smoothly without matrices and related concepts of linear algebra; their use is really essential. Our experience is that making some particular matrix tricks very familiar to students can substantially increase their insight into linear statistical models (and also multivariate statistical analysis). In matrix algebra, there are handy, sometimes even very simple tricks which simplify and clarify the treatment of a problem both for the student and for the professor. Of course, the concept of a "trick" is not uniquely defined by a trick we simply mean here a useful important handy result.
In this book we collect together our Top Twenty favourite matrix tricks for linear statistical models.

In teaching linear statistical models to first-year graduate students or to final-year undergraduate students there is no way to proceed smoothly without matrices and related concepts of linear algebra; their use is really essential. Our experience is that making some particular matrix tricks very familiar to students can substantially increase their insight into linear statistical models (and also multivariate statistical analysis). In matrix algebra, there are handy, sometimes even very simple "tricks" which simplify and clarify the treatment of a problem-both for the student and for the professor. Of course, the concept of a trick is not uniquely defined-by a trick we simply mean here a useful important handy result. In this book we collect together our Top Twenty favourite matrix tricks for linear statistical models.

This is an unusual book because it contains a great deal of formulas. Hence it is a blend of monograph, textbook, and handbook.It is intended for students and researchers who need quick access to useful formulas appearing in the linear regression model and related matrix theory. This is not a regular textbook - this is supporting material for courses given in linear statistical models. Such courses are extremely common at universities with quantitative statistical analysis programs."

In this new biography of Chris Barnard we not only learn about the life of South Africa’s most famous surgeon, from his Beaufort West childhood through his studies locally and abroad to his prominent marriages – and divorces – but James Styan also examines the impact of the historic heart transplant on Barnard’s personal life and South African society at large, where apartheid legislation often made the difficulties of medicine even more convoluted.

The role of black medical staff like Hamilton Naki is explored, as is the intense rivalry that arose between other famous heart surgeons and Barnard. How did Barnard manage to beat them all in this race of life and death? How much did his famous charisma have to do with it all? And in the light of his later years, his subsequent successes and considerable failures, what is Barnard’s legacy today?

Styan covers it all in this fascinating new account of a real heartbreaker that coincides with the 50th anniversary of the first heart transplant.

The English Stage tells the story of English drama through its many changes in style and convention from medieval times to the present day. John Styan analyzes the key features of staging, including early street theater and public performance, the evolution of the playhouse and the private space, and the pairing of theory and stagecraft in the works of modern dramatists. Giving a critical performance analysis, the author closely examines a few key plays from each age to demonstrate how they succeed on stage. He also focuses on several major playwrights--Marlowe, Shakespeare, Jonson, and Shaw--and discusses their stagecraft in detail. Styan can be considered among a small number of influential scholars who have helped to develop theater history from its origins in literary studies into an independent and respected field.

Restoration comedy disappeared from the stage for nearly 200 years until it was revived early this century. Without the benefit of a performance tradition has suffered from an inappropriate literary and moralistic criticism which continues to this day. Yet this brilliant court and coterie comedy of sexual and social behaviour was an extraordinary success in its own time, and enjoys a unique place in theatrical history as an example of the interplay possible between the stage and the audience. In this book John Styan persuades us that only through a performance approach to the great plays of Etherege, Wycherley, Dryden, Shadwell, Vanbrugh, Congreve and Farquhar can we recover a sense of their value. Restoration Comedy in Performance is liberally illustrated with contemporary drawings and modern photographs, and it draws extensively upon documentary and visual evidence of the seventeenth century in order to suggest the importance of the costume and customs, manners and behaviour of the age to an understanding of the sort of theatre and drama it produced. Professor Styan also discusses the problems encountered in the early attempts to revive the comedies in the twentieth century, and pauses frequently in order to offer a descriptive account of a moment of staging or to recreate a scene or a sequence of comic repartee or action. The book aims to bring back to life, therefore, something of a lost art form, not as a piece of conventional stage or production history, but as a true attempt to recognize the virtues of Restoration comedy as a performing art.

How do our ways of perceiving and producing Shakespeare differ from those of the nineteenth century, and how interrelated has the work of scholars and directors become over this century? Professor Styan's purpose in this book is to discuss the 'revolution' in Shakespeare studies implied by these questions.

Max Reinhardt (1873 1943), one of the major theatre figures of the twentieth century, was among the first to establish the importance of the director in modern theatre. His fame outside Germany rests somewhat unfairly on his distorted image as producer of giant, Gothic spectacles staged in vast auditoria or cathedral squares. In this book Professor Styan is concerned to illustrate Reinhardt's astonishing versatility as director of more than six hundred productions, which together cover almost all the dramatic genres and all the major theatrical movements of the time. Professor Styan explains Reinhardt's place in the history of Austrian and German culture and world theatrical movements. Using contemporary reviews and the Regiebuch, or director's promptbook, he describes in detail the organization, performance and impact of some of the director's major productions: his symbolist interpretation of Ghosts and Salome; the expressionist experiment with plays by Wedekind, Strindberg, Sorge and Buchner; the Shakespeare sequence, including the classic A Midsummer Night's Dream; productions of Greek tragedy, Goethe, and the baroque spectacles such as Everyman, which together cover almost all the dramatic genres and all the major theatrical movements of the time. Professor Styan explains Reinhardt's place in the history of Austrian and German culture and world theatrical movements. Using contemporary reviews and the Regiebuch, or director's promptbook, he describes in detail the organization, performance and impact of some of the director's major productions: his symbolist interpretation of Ghosts and Salome; the expressionist experiment with plays by Wedekind, Strindberg, Sorge and Buchner; the Shakespeare sequence, including the classic A Midsummer Night's Dream; productions of Greek tragedy, Goethe, and the baroque spectacles such as Everyman.

Buchner is the forerunner of expression, followed by Wedekind and Strindberg. The style is then traced from Kaiser and Toller to O'Neill, Wilder and the later O'Casey. Important producers are Reinhardt and Meyerhold. Epic theatre is studied from Piscator and Brecht to Durrenmatt and Weiss, Arden and Bond, and is seen as flourishing in offshoots of documentary theatre. This book was first published in 1981.

For a full understanding of any text, careful consideration must be given to its life in performance. In this rewarding study of four of Chekhov's major plays - Uncle Vanya, The Seagull, The Cherry Orchard and Three Sisters - J. L. Styan demonstrates the development of Chekhov's skills as a dramatist and discusses stage action, portrayal of character, differing twentieth-century productions and the audience reactions they evoked.

Plays are, of course, meant to be seen, not read, but many people find it impossible to visit the theatre regularly and it is for them that Professor Styan intends this book, originally published in 1965, to promote better understanding of the dramatist's intentions and fuller enjoyment of the play. He defines what a play is and discusses such topics as the development of the theatre - its different stages, kinds of drama and types of character - the tone and tempo in which the play is written, the roles of actor and audience and the structure and interplay of plot and subplot. Charts of theatrical history, a glossary and reading lists, as well as drawings and diagrams by David Gentleman, provide further help for the reader.

This book shows how a play 'works' in the theatre: how it generates life, meaning and excitement on the stage for the audience. It is self evident that a play must communicate or it is not a play at all. Professor Styan argues that, while communication in drama begins with the script, the value or power of a play must be tested upon an audience. In the theatre experience, it is not so much the elements of drama on the stage or the perceptions of the audience which are important, as the relationships between them. It follows that the study of drama is the study of how the stage compels its audience to be involved in its actual processes; it is a study of a particular social situation. Professor Styan discusses in detail the particular social situation, conditions of performance and physical playhouse in which a play thrives. There is a wealth of examples from all periods of Western drama. He especially deals with plays which make no pretence to 'realism', and much of the discussion turns upon the power and success of Shakespeare as a playwright. This book will appeal to students, actors and directors of drama, as well as the theatregoers. Professor Styan's insistence on criticism based on the theatrical experience will make this an important book for other drama critics.

Much of twentieth-century drama defies the traditional pigeon-holes of tragedy and comedy: the heroes are not straightforwardly heroic; the subject-matter seems at some times grimly realistic and at others nearer to pure fantasy. Professor Styan explains and illuminates the nature of this dark, paradoxical comedy. He reminds us, first, that this is not a purely modern phenomenon: many great plays of the past have similarly defied classification and have called for an equally vacillating response from their audience. But nonetheless this dramatic genre has had its clearest expression in the last sixty years: we are shown in detail how its techniques have developed from Ibsen and Chekhov to Pirandello, Brecht and contemporary playwrights such as Ionesco, Beckett, Tennessee Williams and Pinter. The author brings us to realize that the playwright, by creating complex tensions in the action of the play between the actor and the audience and within the individual spectator, is able to explore new areas of human feeling and response. In this second edition of The Dark Comedy Professor Styan has brought the book up to date in relation to recent plays and theatrical developments. He has modified some earlier judgements and added detailed analyses of scenes from Brecht's Mother Courage and from Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Anyone who takes an intelligent interest in theatre-going will find profit and stimulus in this book. It covers a wide range of subject-matter; but its underlying theme is clear, forceful and unified.

Outlines the potentialities and limitations of the Elizabethan playhouse and how Shakespeare exploited them, discussing the plays as a sequence of stage effects planned to enrich, modify and reinforce each other.

This is an introduction to the drama, singling out and discussing its various elements, with detailed and generous quotation from masterpieces. Styan emphasizes that plays are meant to be judged in performance, not in the study, and that the play is something created by a co-operation of author, actor, producer and audience. The actor is doing something for the author's words; he is making the play work; and so is the spectator as he responds to the art of the actor, the producer and the playwright. It is a unique relationship, and the play in performance must be judged by 'theatrical' standards as well as literary ones. Styan begins with the elements of a dramatic text and the way they are built together. For every aspect - words, movement, tempo - and for larger considerations, such as verse-drama, convention, 'character', and audience-participation, Styan provides close analyses of excerpts from plays by Shakespeare, Ibsen, Chekhov, Wilde, Shaw, Strindberg, Pirandello, Synge, Anouilh, Sartre, Eliot and others. These detailed expositions give an insight into the aims and techniques of the particular playwrights as well as into the general themes. This is an ideal introduction to the art of the theatre for the general reader and the student of literature.

A tri-volume, heavily illustrated history of drama from Ibsen to the present concentrates on different dramatic genres and includes photographs that illustrate first performances, theaters and stage designs.

The theories of Wagner and Nietzsche provide the basic principles for this volume, disseminated by the work of Appia and Craig, and affecting the later plays of Ibsen, Maeterlinck, and Lugné-Poe’s Théatre de Le’Oeuvre. Jarry is seen as the precursor of surrealism; later symbolist elements are found in the plays of Claudel, Giraudoux, Yeats, Eliot, Lorca and Pirandello. Artaud’s theatre of cruelty is related to the work of Peter Brook. The theatre of the absurd is illustrated in Sartre, Beckett, Pinter and Ionesco. Recent avant-garde theatre in America and Britain also reveals elements of symbolism.

In 1998 the South African government was warned that the country was running out of electricity. Despite the warnings, the decision was taken not to invest in new power stations. Had the warnings been heeded, South Africa could have had a new power station up and running by 2006 and load shedding may never have happened. Instead, in 2007, as predicted, South Africa ran out of electricity.

Eight years later, the crisis has deepened and despite assurances to the contrary by government leadership, it has the potential to become the biggest post-apartheid crisis in South Africa. By 2015 load shedding cost the South African economy an estimated R2 billion per day.

Is the situation getting better or worse? Are the interventions working or is a blackout inevitable? What can be done and what do future scenarios look like?

Blackout: The Eskom Crisis provides a look at what’s happening to one of the greatest power utilities in the world, the greatest on the African continent. It deals with everything from load shedding to blackouts and unpacks the issues raging around candlelight dinners in households across South Africa today.