Can you write?
As soon as my first book hit the market, I started receiving e-mail messages, phone calls and short messages on my mobile phone from people from various places and backgrounds. Some just wanted to congratulate me. Some wanted advice. It would have helped me a lot if I had received messages from critics as well, but it seems critics have decided to keep their opinions to themselves.
It is true that critics, especially those who are strangers, can give very useful comments about anything because they have nothing to lose by calling a spade a spade. They can easily say, “This is a whole lot of trash!” Read more
A chapter from my forthcoming novel
Vainge vagere muhambautare yemapurisa yerudzi rweSantana, iyo yakange imire pedyo nemugwagwa waibatanidza guta guru reHarare neMarondera, Macheke nedzimwe nzvimbo dzekumabvazuva kwenyika. Kumavirira kwaive nemidurukidzwa yeHarare. Zuva rakange ronyura, makore aive pamuchecheto atindivara neutsvuku hwemaoshanhede aro kunge donje rakange rapukutiswa chironda namukoti ndokukandwa mubheseni rebhuruu.
Mumwe wemapurisa maviri aya akange ari mutsva pakamba, achiri zvake chijaya chakange chichiine mapundu kumeso. Zvisinei hazvo, aive ari mukomana akasvika, mukomana wekuti ukamupakurira tsinde resadza, airipedza rese. Zvakare, waiti wamuona achidya kudaro, hawaida kuzodenana naye kusvika pakukandirana zvibhakera. Zita rake raive Dermot Mhike. Read more
A moving novel from Sarudzai Mubvakure
London based Zimbabwean, Sarudzai Mubvakure has just released her debut novel, entitled A Disappointing Truth…
Review by Melissa Levine: The Tragic Life of Sarah Witt, the lead character so frequently encounters catastrophic events that forgiveness does not seem to have a place in her life. But it is the choice to forgive that ultimately leads the young, bi-racial woman to unconditional love and true happiness.
“Love ignores the faults. And that’s why no matter what, our love is forever.”
Mubvakure’s story unfolds in London, New York, Zimbabwe and ends in Scotland were Sarah accepts the limitations of those who have caused her harm and makes the decision to move forward in her life.
In the fall of 1971, a young woman is violently raped in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Her assault will greatly impact the lives of several people, including Farai, the young boy who witnesses the crime and a group of English entrepreneurs who have set up businesses in Rhodesia to make their fortunes. The members of the “English Boys Club” become deeply involved in the plight of this young woman whose attack results in the birth of a daughter. Read more
Unlocking the silence of the mind that dreamed the dream
(Excerpts from Spirit Talk: The Wisdom of Stone Revisited, work in progress based on newspaper articles)
Give us a thousand,
another thousand,
and a million years
and seal the wisdom of our forefathers
inside stone
Musaemura B. Zimunya, “Zimbabwe Bird”
…one begs to ask what is education? I would argue that an education system that limits, blinds, cuts off indigenous knowledge systems, tongues and perpetuates ignorance of one’s socio- historical and cultural heritage is not an education at all. Indeed, an education system that teaches that the past is dead can only create a nation of the walking dead. An education system that that teaches that our history is nothing but darkness before the coming of colonialism is a form of racial suicide. It is a form of selling away a nation’s soul, a people’s heritage, down the river over and over again… Read more
Visions of ailing men in Chenjerai Hove’s ‘Bones’ & Shimmer Chinodya’s ‘Strife’
Professor Robert Muponde
On Thursday 16 October, the 5.30pm Literary Evening at The Book Café extends a warm welcome to Professor Robert Muponde from the Department of English, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
Responding to a long-standing invitation by Pamberi Trust, he will make a presentation based on the work of two of Zimbabwe’s best-loved authors, entitled ‘Visions of Ailing Men in Chenjerai Hove’s Bones and Shimmer Chinodya’s Strife.
The paper seeks to explore the ways in which differently placed dystopian masculinities in the two novels help us to think about an evolving narrative of postcolonial Zimbabwe.
Mr Memory Chirere of the UZ Department of English will chair the ensuing discussion. Read more
In search of Tsitsi Dangarembga
WordPress, the platform for my blog Moments In Literature, has a feature called “Search Engine Terms”, which tells you what words people searched in order to end up viewing your posts. Nearly daily, the visitors to Moments in Literature come through searches of Tsitsi Dangarembga, using the following terms: bira Dangarembga, interviews with Tsitsi Dangarembga, Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions, Zimbabwean literature Dangarembga, Dangarembga new excerpt, and many others.
So people are looking for Dangarembga, people are talking. And they have reasons to. First, the world is leaning towards focusing on Zimbabwean literature, what with all the drama that the country has been going through. Early next year the world of reading will be greeted with two books by Petina Gappah, which promise to be huge successes (Gappah is a good writer), and there is likely to be hightened interest in the literature of Zimbabwe in general.
Perhaps, the interest in Dangarembga is a reflection of what’s on the minds of many readers (I am assuming it’s not one person visiting my blog through numerous, if not obsessive, searches for Dangarembga’s works); it is a reflection of the fact that there is renewed interest in her works, or in finding clues about Zimbabwe in her novels. Read more…
