To me, the (July 25) death of Jani Allan, and a good part of her life, is one more piece of the river towns I see drifting off into the darkness like space debris, and I want to tell you about it.
For a while, New Hope and Lambertville were home to a concentration of the unusual, the accomplished and the inspirational that transcended wealth or fame. It was astonishing who you would run into before the Great Homogenization, and Jani, or Juliette as she called herself once she settled in Lambertville, was part of that cast.
I initially knew Juliette as someone who greeted and seated guests at Hamilton’s Grill. She served tables too. Juliette was a touch exotic. She had a posh South African accent, and a class and style that made her different, yet no more outside the periphery than any of the locals. There was no indication of the nationally famous South African writer; the best-read columnist and media personality who had interviewed global political leaders and A-list movie stars; and whose comments, opinions, and witticisms were once followed by a huge population.
I was odd-man-out at a party one evening, so I pulled a book off the shelf to bide my time. It was a volume of famous quotes. I opened it at random to entertain myself. I was going through the chapter of topics starting with “F,” such as Family, Fame, and Fashion, and there I saw:
“Dressing with style is akin to issuing a manifesto; dressing fashionably is like signing a petition.” — Jani Allan.
Pretty good, eh? You can find many of her quotes online.
There she was, a past, famous, high-flying, popular writer for major papers, with a razor-sharp mind and extraordinary wit, smiling patiently while you asked for a different table, not two blocks away.
She had endured a public scandal in her home country, fled to England, where she again established herself as a writer, before coming to America — New Jersey of all places — and living a very spare life as a waitress in our town of uncommon creatives and makers.
There is a lot more to Jani’s story, but it’s the wild swing of her fortune and the élan vital with which she faced life that linked the individual and place.
If I had to reduce the river towns of those days to a word, it would be “spirit.” Jani Allan certainly had that. She wrote a book in 2015, a tell-all about her life. She returned to Johannesburg to promote it and was embraced, but then Juliette came back.
I bought the book and read it. I remember thinking that some of us make better life decisions than others. People are generally good at several things and not so good at others, but in some cases, the mix is in extremes.
Jani Allan was a person of extremes, carried by the winds of fate. It is telling that her death was reported immediately around the world. This woman of immense capabilities, who lived in a small apartment in Lambertville, doting on her Pomeranians.
Her life was exceptional. Every bit a manifesto. I’m not surprised she landed here.
Au revoir et paix, Jani.
Robert Beck lives in Solebury.
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