' Every little thing I do, everything I write about from slavery to interracial love to vegetarianism - all of them are done with the intent on making the world a kinder place, more harmonious, compassionate not selfish, creating awareness of injustices, trying to right wrongs and saving innocent animal lives. 

I have made many mistakes in my life, some huge and others not so significant - but they have taught me a lot. About myself, about others.  We are all just stardust, so tiny in the great big universe, and we should never overestimate our little lives.

We should try however, to have a positive impact on the world we live in - and not a negative one. We should think globally and act locally.'             Inia Jardine

Inia says : 'This bio is a summary of certain parts of my past, not the whole me. What happens from here is still being written as I am still evolving, even at this age!' 

 

Inia (1964 - still around) was born in Cape Town during the height of Apartheid, where segregation of the races was a fact of life. She grew up instinctively feeling that it was wrong and during her years of attending University organised political meetings for the 'left wing' political party of the time and after studies danced her nights away. 
 

She loves the ocean and its creatures but had too much compassion for animals to continue in her chosen study field of Marine Biology as University zoology practicals involved quite a bit of animal dissection. She changed to Horticulture, her second major. After being told that she was allergic to plants, grass, pollen, animal hairs, feathers and dust, she decided to ignore the medical fraternity and follow her heart. She says 'In retrospect, I should have made Geology my major instead of third subject and continued on in the Marine Archaeology field. I have always been fascinated by geology and could have combined that with my love of the ocean.'

Inia is currently semi retired, writing books and living with a lovely rescue cat Mesanitha in a small rented cottage on the coast. She writes with the sound of the ocean and the music of the seventies and eighties as inspiration. The third book in the Visions Trilogy - Visions of Time, has been entered into the StorytellersUK2019 contest. 

 

I believe in reincarnation - Inia states, the fact that most of my stories originate in my dreams, my visions, links me  in some way to Samuel Taylor Coleridge. You never know...

In honour of him 

​

Kubla Khan
Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1772-1834

Or a Vision in a Dream. A Fragment

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
    Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:
And ’mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

    The shadow of the dome of pleasure
    Floated midway on the waves;
    Where was heard the mingled measure
    From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
    A damsel with a dulcimer
    In a vision once I saw;
    It was an Abyssinian maid,
    And on her dulcimer she played,
    Singing of Mount Abora.
    Could I revive within me
    Her symphony and song,
    To such a deep delight ’twould win me,
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

Inia is a passionate vegetarian/vegan and animal activist, and enjoys meditating, walking & taking pictures - especially of animals, plants, the ocean and clouds.

https://www.facebook.com/IniaJardineAuthor