“When I wrote hoe de eerste vonken zichtbaar waren, it was 2015, and the general public of the Netherlands was only just getting to know all these terms, like ‘intersectionality’ and stuff; and I was just kind of writing about what it was like growing up in a small Dutch town, and always being the only black girl in class…” The annual Open Book Festival takes place from 4 to 8 September 2019. The award-winning Dutch poet Simone Atangana Bekono will be attending the festival. She talks to Cliffordene Norton about her first visit to South Africa, her love of film and her poetry.