WINZ Newsletter, Issue No 11

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL FEATURES ZIMBABWEAN LITERATURE

By Beaven Tapureta 


                                                            

International appreciation for Zimbabwean writers continues to rise, despite less availability of the publications in the local bookstores.

Eleven Zimbabwean voices, making up the New Writing from Zimbabwe section, paint alive the Warwick Review Vol.III No 4, December 2009 issue with varying degrees of emotion coming out of deep scrutiny of events occurring in society.

There is so much variety in the writing styles as well.

The works by the local writers and poets in this latest issue reverberate with a quest for emancipation from unfavorable situations in life. Life and happiness are seen as universal gifts to man. Without these gifts, there is always turmoil.

The late Julius Chingono is among the Zimbabwean writers published in this magazine, with two poems entitled 20-044L and Disabled Disabled. Chingono’s poetry mixes humor and irony; you always find a hidden meaning behind the amusing arrangement of his words.

For example,

looking at me/they see/ a disabled disabled/with limping lame eyes/blind limbs/deaf mouth/dumb ears/some creature/unfit misfit (Disabled Disabled)

Other writers featured are Shimmer Chinodya, John Eppel, and the new generation of Lawrence Hoba, Wadzanai Mhute, Jane Morris, Tinashe Muchuri, Tinashe Mushakavanhu, No Violet Mkha Bulawayo, Champuno, and M.C Chihota.

Shimmer Chinodya’s mystery story Whispers from the Deep uses a unique style of writing in which the first person (Mrs. Sharai Mutero), an old woman, informally addresses her audience, the reader as ‘you’, specifically as mwanangu/ my son.

The first person (the main character) is engaged in what could be peripherally called soliloquy. As the narrator tells the history of her reincarnated husband, first to a journalist and then to her daughter Mucha, puzzling memories of the past are brought forward to clash with modern day cultural reality.

Jane Morris, founder of Amabooks publishers, turns into writer in this issue, with a story called Mending the Gate in which a narrator reminisces about his friend Roland, a private but peace loving man. In the story, the narrator meets Roland fixing his gate. Sibanda’s notorious bull from the vicinity always goads Roland’s gate out of position and Roland silently fixes his gate. The act of mending the gate becomes a metaphor for Roland’s love for peace, something for which he is remembered. Unfortunately, Roland, who keeps words to himself, dies of throat cancer, a disease into which he calmly resigned. After his funeral, Sibanda’s bull does it again and this time, the whole community comes together to mend the gate as a fitting homage to Roland.

In addition to the fiction and poetry, there are four commentaries and reviews of Zimbabwean literature and writers such as Tsitsi Dangarembga (The Book of Not), Brian Chikwava (Harare North), Bryony Rheam (September Sun).

Although the magazine was published before Chingono died, it is a fair tribute to him because he did not see it as it arrived late in Zimbabwe. His portrait was also used as the magazine cover photograph, courtesy of Irene Staunton.

The Warwick Review has other sections entitled ‘Going Back’ and ‘Fleeing Forward’, under which other various published writers and poets from the rest of the world speak from different viewpoints and forms, tackling different issues initially taken for granted.

This quarterly magazine is published by the Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies at the University of Warwick, UK.

POETRY

I long for the moment

I cherish the moment

That revealed you in the mystery of my miseries,

A golden time when I felt the warmth of belonging

I long for the moment

Of sweetness everlasting

The moment that defined our destinies

When I looked in your eyes and saw a reflection of joy, happiness and love

Let me bask in the sunshine of your beauty

Let me bask with you at the tropical beach

Long I to laugh with you

Walk the paths of our inner selves

And ride the waves of our romance

In the distant seas of timelessness

By Courage Muganji, Braeside, Harare

EMMANUEL SIGAUKE, EDITOR OF MUNYORI LITERARY JOURNAL SAYS

                                                                   Emmanuel Sigauke

I am pleased to announce the release of the first 2011 issue of Munyori Literary Journal. The seventeen writers in this issue introduce us to a wealth of material from different parts of the world. Enjoy great poetry by R.S. Carlson (USA), Louie Crew (USA), Nana Fredua-Agyeman (Ghana), Liang Yujing (China), Mike Mware (Zimbabwe)...; fiction by Miriam Shumba, Kudzai Ndanga, and NoViolet Bulawayo (all from Zimbabwe) and Joanne Hillhouse (Antigua). We have an interview of Bapsi Sidhwa (Pakistan) by Sunil Sharma (India), and a book review by Memory Chirere (Zimbabwe). More fiction from Kenya's Patrick O. Ochieng...and more.

Since this is only the first of six planned issues, we look forward to a year of great reading. Send your work for consideration. Open the journal here: http://www.munyori.com/