INJASUTI
An introduction
Sometime in 2004 I had a story seed, an idea I shared with an old friend. I wanted to write a story with ancient Carthage as the theme. I then started research and worked my way through Hebrew texts, Phoenician texts, the Punic Wars, most particularly the Third Punic War. Over the years I looked at names of ancient Phoenician gods and goddesses, Phoenician birth names, the history of Carthage starting with Queen Dido who was a niece of Queen Jezebel, wife of King Ahab of Israel.
In all this time I had only done research on and off. I had written other major works between 2004 and 2008, but never got to working on "Injasuti", the name I had given the story right from the start. The name "Injasuti" is a Zulu word meaning "place of the replete dog". It is a reference to heavys rains, when the river is in flood and is one of the rivers in the Kwa-Zulu Natal Province of South Africa.
I have always used my work - the major works, that is - as a learning tool, and to educate while I entertain. So I thought how could I use the idea of ancient Carthage [today, the city of Tunis, capital city of Tunisia] for this story, to educate and entertain at the same time? I hope that the reader comes away from this story having learned something!
What inspired the content, the way the theme followed the ideals of Trek?
I have to go back to just over a year ago, when I purchased the complete three season set of the Original Series of Star Trek. The stories of Kirk and Spock completely enthralled me. I had last seen some episodes in the late seventies and the details after such a long time were hazy. Their exploits, their ideals, the way Kirk expressed many times the Federation ideals; the exciting and original stories ["Mirror, Mirror" is a standout] kept me hooked and gave me the inspiration to commence with Injasuti, started around June 2007. I wanted to imbue "Injasuti" with the same spirit of adventure, romance and "going where no man has gone before", at the same time expressing a theme that was timeless. I hope that I have succeeded to an extent.
While the story is not on such a grand scale as "Strangers when we meet" and "Ethan Bellamy", I feel that with so much research that has gone into it, elevates this for me among my favourites.
I offer my most eternal gratitude to Mary Stark who edited my revised story after working on the first draft and thank her most graciously from my heart for her time, patience and love in working on "Injasuti". Hubby Dee who listened to my continuous nattering and offered a word of advice here and there, all those who read and offered comments on the "Prologue" when it was posted a while ago.
I hope you'll enjoy this story. The link for each part will be at the end of the chapter.
vanhunks
August 2008