KZN Literary Tourism
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| Established | 2002-present |
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| Type | Research Project |
| Location |
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| Leader | Lindy Stiebel |
| Slogan | where literature meets tourism |
| Website | www |
KZN Literary Tourism is a literary tourism research project initiated in 2002 by Professor Lindy Stiebel, a lecturer in the English Studies department at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. The project has created an online archive of over a 100 writers linked to the KwaZulu-Natal province, collected reviews of local literature, conducted interviews of local authors, promoted local literary events such as Time of the Writer and investigated “the links between literature and tourism in scholarly colloquia and publications”. The project has also been responsible for creating eight writer trails which attempt to connect writers, their works and place within the province.
KZN Literary Tourism was born out of a “larger National Research Foundation project focused on Identity and Tourism, based at the University of Durban-Westville”. Despite the wealth of literary talent produced by KwaZulu-Natal very little had been done to promote literary tourism within the province. After being given a five-year grant by the National Research Foundation (NRF), the project began to remedy this situation by constructing an “online archive of writers associated in one way or another with KwaZulu-Natal …; to investigate the links between literature and tourism in scholarly colloquia and publications; and to support a number of students involved in the project through bursaries”. In addition to this, the project created a “series of documentary films made by David Basckin and Zoë Molver about writers including Lewis Nkosi, Marguerite Poland and poets Douglas Livingstone and Roy Campbell. These films were archived by the National English Literary Museum (NELM) in Grahamstown.
The post-NRF part of the project has focused on the development of the project’s website. This includes improving the online archive which would also feature the writers on a Google Earth map that displays the places they are associated with. Additionally, the site included reviews of local literature, podcasts, promotion of local literary events such as Time of the Writer, and drawing revenue from advertising for publishers and booksellers.
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Wikipedia