Between Two Worlds (an Educational Conundrum‪)‬

Author John Bonelle’s inspiration for writing this book came from an unlikely source, namely, Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury tales. The tales of the pilgrims travelling to the shrine of Thomas Becket are outrageously funny, raunchy, and even despicable in the description of sexual exploits, seduction. rape, swearing and bickering. These tales suggest that the road to salvation is a path to deliverance. As the author paged through the prologue, he saw reference to John Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress.

Bunyan's "The Author's Apology For His Book", had resonance for his narrative.

"When at first I took my pen I hand
This for to write, I did not understand
That I at all should make a little book
In such a mode; nay, I had undertook
To make another; which, when almost done,
Before I was aware, I thus begun."

In writing this brief memoir, John Bonelle looked at each part of his life from the perspective of his "being", at each stage of his development as a child, as a pre-adolescent, as a teenager, an adolescent and a youth. At each stage, he learnt new things about life from various sources. This is his story.

Readers will appreciate the many entertaining incidents and anecdotes from this life story of a teacher and deputy headmaster at various schools in Kwazulu-Natal. The author’s work was not confined within the school boundaries but extended to the greater good of the community, which saw him working socially, academically, and culturally in outreach programmes until his retirement in 1993.