Writers & witnesses: a writer’s perspective on journeys in reading & writing zimbabwe
Paper Presented to ZIBF 2009 Indaba: Reading & Writing Zimbabwe:
I am told, by both my father and maternal uncle (after whom I get my so called English and Christian name: Stanley- it’s actually Jewish), that even as a boy I used to be fascinated by words written on paper. I would, according to them, pick up any scrap of written matter, whether it be the remains of a book, newspaper or magazine wherever I had found it and lovingly lug it home and put away somewhere safe. Why, they would ask, and I would shrug, saying, I want to keep it so that I can read it in future. This was of course, during my preliterate days. A memory I do have from those days is one of me, sitting on the veranda of my father’s store at Nyangavi Township in Guruve, with a book that belonged to one of my elder brothers, who were already in school, on my lap, a scholarly frown on my brow, lips moving, a finger slowly tracing word-by-word, sentence-by-sentence. This always took the people who came by to shop by surprise: “Mwana uyu akutogona kuverenga?” (“Is this child able to read already?)”. They would laugh when they were told that it was only a ruse on my part, but little did they or myself know that this was a sign of a great passion for reading and inevitably writing that already lay embedded somewhere deep in my blood and would eventually blossom as I grew older. Read more
