15+ questions for Max du Preez

1. Describe yourself in a hashtag.

#misunderstood ​​
(I'm pretty sure most people who have ever dealt with me would have written a different hashtag, something that can't be used in a family newspaper. And I don't mean “boos (evil)".)

2. What do you listen to when you are alone? What type of music?

When I write, I only listen to Mozart and Beethoven. I still have an ear for the music of my youth – The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Donovan, Kristoffersen, Dylan and especially The Doors. But I'm constantly on a quest to discover new music. Before Spotify, I used to set up playlists on my MacBook and looking back on it now, it's mostly World Music. That's how I discovered Indian, Congolese and Chilean music, also Mongolia's “throat singing". I discovered a lot of my favourite music on my extensive travels: Senegalese, Portuguese fado, Roma or gypsy music from the Balkan states, Irish folk, Arabic music from Tunisia, Madagascar rock. Every now and then I pick up something from my 19-year-old laatlammetjie, but the current harvest is meagre. Yet there is one man's music that I return to every now and then: the absolutely genius Johannes Kerkorrel.

3. Which international publications do you read?

Yo, I spend hopelessly too much money on subscriptions to foreign publications. The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Financial Times, or De Groene Amsterdammer, Politico, UnHerd, De Correspondent, The Guardian and more. My favourite remains The New Yorker.

4. If you were to recommend one book to everyone, what would it be?

I don't particularly read fiction – I only have a routine of reading the latest Deon Meyer every year between Christmas and New Year. A golden old one is Noël Mostert's Frontiers: The Epic of South Africa's Creation and the Tragedy of the Xhosa People, which is decades old. A newer book I would recommend is Jonny Steinberg's Winnie & Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage. And I am a Karel Schoeman fan.

5. How often do you check with binoculars to see something suspicious going on at Simon's Town's naval base?

I've noticed that people all over the world who have a view of a harbour are obsessed with seeing the ships coming and going several times a day. (By the way, The Shipping News with Kevin Spacey, Julianne Moore and Judi Dench is still one of my favourite movies.) I live right above Simon's Town Harbour, halfway up the mountain, so I'm acutely aware of the activity – it's just that there isn't much. But I saw the Lady R steaming in and watched it for two days, and recently again the Russian, Indian and Brazilian warships. I do use my binoculars every time I take a break to look for whales, dolphins or orcas and see something at least once a day. It's a great joy in my life. Sometimes the whales swim into the harbour and then I hear them blowing as I sit behind my computer in my office.

6. Your best action movie(s)?

Uhm, I don't know the titles. If I've overtaxed my brain for 10 hours or so and want to quieten the noise in my head before I go to sleep, I like to sit in front of the TV and find an escapist action movie on Netflix. But I can never remember what the titles are; sometimes I watch something and realise halfway through that I've already seen it. I like simple stories with at least slightly intelligent dialogue and plot, preferably a good guy hero, but it shouldn't test me intellectually. I watch enough films and series that do that. I recently enjoyed an action movie with Denzel Washington taking down the mafia in a small Italian town and one with Ryan Gosling fighting and unmasking the CIA, but I can't remember the titles of the movies.

7. Have you ever asked anyone for their signature? Tell.

No, not even as a child. The closest I came to it was Nelson Mandela who gifted me his biography with a personal message on the front (after I'd done a TV interview with him). And Desmond Tutu who gave me the reports of the Truth Commission with his signature and a thank-you note for what my team and I from the SABC series Special Report on the TRC had done for it.

8. A fictional character you overidentify with or wish you were like?

Without a doubt Don Quixote, from Miguel de Cervantes' 1615 book, The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha. (Though there were times in my life when I felt more like Sancho Panza.)

9. What were you like at university?

I was only 17 years old when I arrived in Stellenbosch, just after nine horrible months of conscription. I was a shy, insecure boerseun from Kroonstad. But at least I started to come to life around my third year. Late bloomer, me.

10. Most embarrassing moment of your life?

The University of Cape Town gave me an honorary degree in 1990 and asked me to give the speech at the graduation ceremony. This was during the [initial] rough days of Vrye Weekblad, and in my speech I delivered a tirade against Big Capital and its role in the economy and apartheid. And then I stood before the chancellor to receive my degree, and discovered it was one Harry Oppenheimer…

11. The most expensive thing you've ever blown your money on?

Flight tickets.

12. How would you describe your style?

Do I have a style? My style in terms of how people perceive me is probably that I am impetuous and opinionated, even surly. (I have a very low emotional IQ – my wife calls me an emotional bonsai – and I prefer my own company.) I like to dress stylishly, with good shoes. I haven't worn a tie in decades. I'm a car snob and prefer Italian and French cars, [and also] Land Rovers of which I've had quite a few.

13. If you could choose another or a second profession, what would it be?

I have had a very adventurous and rich life as a journalist, but if I were 18 years old today, I would rather be a professional saxophonist, sculptor, architect or panel beater. The immediate gratification of fixing and repainting something is very attractive to me.

14. Your five least loved South African politicians?

Dali Mpofu, Magnus Malan, Jacob Zuma, Panyaza Lesufi and Helen Zille.

15. The most stressful moment of your career?

In 1978, a few media colleagues and I hired a plane to follow the UN's envoy to Namibia, Martti Ahtisaari, as he visited all the regions in the country. Our plane crashed into the ground just after take-off in Opuwo in the Kaokoveld. I was trapped in a burning wreckage for several minutes, with a crushed arm and a face full of deep cuts. I was very sure these were my last moments. Fortunately, there were policemen on the runway who pulled us out of the wreckage. I then flew to Oshakati with my head on Ahtisaari's lap in his plane while he closed my wounds and I was stitched up there by a duty doctor to stop the bleeding. (The journalist Chris Louw after I started Vrye Weekblad in 1988, declared it as a known fact that I had suffered brain damage. My sister Cecilia's comment was: No, he's always been like that.)

16. Something you did when you were younger that makes you cringe now?

I had sideburns up to my neck for a while.

17. Which minister's job would you be best at if you had to take over?

Foreign affairs. (Hehehe. Max, the diplomat.) Maybe correctional services? After all, I was Accused Number 1 quite a few times.

18. Moshoeshoe invites you for tea at Thaba Bosiu. What will you ask him?

My great-grandfather, Paul Kruger, went to see the king on Thaba Bosiu as an envoy of the Free State republic. Judging by his autobiography, of which I bought a first edition in Berlin years ago, The Memoirs of Paul Kruger, he was extremely disrespectful to Moshoeshoe. At their first meeting, the king wore his coattails and a top hat. Let me quote how Kruger remembered their second conversation: “In the evening, I sent for Moshesh again to come to see me. Moshesh came, but this time dressed like an ordinary Kaffir, that is, not in European clothes. When he came in, I called to him: ‘Why is Moshesh so long coming? Can’t he come when I send for him?’ Moshesh answered: ‘I am Moshesh.’" (Kruger was 40 years younger than Moshoeshoe.) So if I were to meet the old king now I would apologise for my forebear's behaviour and explain why the Boers were so ignorant about the Basotho and their rich culture.

19. In whose commando would you have liked to fight in the Boer War?

Certainly not in Piet Cronjé's. My grandfather was part of his commando who was captured at Paardeberg and then taken to Ceylon as a prisoner of war. As a child, I had a great admiration for Gen. Christiaan de Wet but later wondered if I might not have sympathised with his brother Piet in my stubbornness.

20. The love of your life?

My wife, Angela. And my dogs. All dogs. I think they played a big role in human evolution. And, of course, my three children.

21. What do you find sexy?

A beautiful mouth. And nose. Smart people who don't think they're smart. Artistic people who are not pretentious.

22. Are you an aesthete?

I am very sensory. Without good art I would be much poorer. When I travel, I mostly look at architecture. Shapes, and colours. I am obsessed with nature's own architecture, especially trees. People who dress sloppily or boringly are always a disappointment to me.

23. If you could play opposite anyone in a love scene in a movie, who would you choose?

Kate Winslet.

24. If you could change anything about yourself, what would it be?

More patience. And a fat bank balance to visit places I haven't been. Like Azerbaijan, Lebanon, Laos and Iceland.

25. What do you think is your superpower?

Determination. Endurance to the point of dumbness.

26. Jou pet hate?

Narrow-mindedness. Untrustworthy people. False assholes. Racists and sexists. Crocs that are not worn ironically.

27. If you could invite three people to dinner, living or deceased, who would it be? And what will you serve?

The Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek. Handré Pollard. Michelle Obama. I will make them my own Durban chicken curry and serve it with krummelpap. (Did you know I'm the pap king of the Cape?)

28. Your last meal?

Smoorsnoek.

29. What are you looking forward to?

Rest and peace. And Bafana Bafana competing at the same international level as the Springboks and the Proteas.

♦ VWB ♦

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