HAPPY
BIRTHDAY DAMBUDZO
By Beaven Tapureta -
WIN Online
Photo captured from the book Dambudzo Marechera (1952 -1987) which carries some poems, pictures,
prose and tributes
June is the month when the late legendary writer
Dambudzo Marechera was born. On June 4, 1952, a baby boy who would change minds
through the gift of writing was born to Zimbabwean parents.
Marechera’s legacy is huge in the world of books; his
image has embodied oracular godliness that he is deified due to his quest for
truth through the written word. For him, the word became life and still is life
today many years after he passed on.
His novella House
of Hunger (1978), is a spear erupting from a troubled mind in search of
meaning (and meaninglessness) of a life amid internal and external chaos. The
book won the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1979 in London. This same year (1979), House of Hunger was re-published in New
York by Pantheon Books. In 1982, Zimbabwe Publishing House released their
edition of the novella. So far House of Hunger
has been translated into the following languages: German, Dutch, and Spanish.
Marechera’s books include Black Sunlight (1980), Black Insider (1990), Cemetery of Mind (1992),
Scrapiron Blues (1994) , and Mindblast
or the Definitive Buddy (1984). Black Sunlight is available in French while Mindblast has been translated into
German.
In Zimbabwe as
well as abroad, Marechera is the subject for most scholars exploring the
delicacies of his highly creative mind. About eight books critical of his works
and life have been published, including the DVD that comes with Moving Spirit: The Legacy of Dambudzo Marechera in the
21st Century published in 2012 and edited by Julie Carnie and
Dobrota Pucherova.
His courage in
confronting ideas and giving them the creative punch is one of the main attractions
to the new generation of writers who may not write to match his writing
standard but who have written and continue to write as they draw from the
spiritual touch of the Marechera inspiration.
Another African writer of note whose birthday is in June
is the renowned playwright and novelist Athol Fugard (South Africa) born on
June 11. Fugard’s most unforgettable work is Sizwe Banzi is Dead (1975) which won him the Tony Award. Today, almost
forty years afterwards, the play is significant in Africa and beyond. Fugard’s
novel Tsotsi was made into a film
which scooped the2005 Oscar for Best Foreign Film.
Other African writers whose birthdays are in June include
Nkem Nwankwo (Nigeria), Mary Karooro
Okurut (Uganda), Ronelda Kamfer (South Africa),
Flourent Couao-Zotti (Benin), Finuala Dowling (South Africa), Amos
Tutuola (Nigeria), Nathalie Etoke, and many others.
There are many
writers and poets born in June, some are dead and others living, and yet to all
of them, we say, viva and long live your legacies!
IN
JAIL THE ONLY TELEPHONE IS THE WASHBASIN HOLE: BLOW AND WE WILL HEAR
Write the poem not from classroom lectures
But from the barricade’s shrieking defiance.
From the mortuary’s brightly frozen monocle
From day’s gunburst to night’s screaming human torch
From bleeding teeth that informed to underground
Perception of black fire
Write the poem not from the rhyme and reason of
England
Nor the Israeli chant that stutters bullets against
Palestinians
Nor (for fuck’s sake) from the negritude that negroed
us
Write the poem, the song, the anthem, from what within
you
Fused goals with guns and created citizens instead of
slaves
Do not scream quietly
We want to hear, to know
And forge the breastplate a poet needs against THEM!
Dambudzo
Marechera
____________________________
WIN NEWSLETTER DEFINITELY COMING A FEW DAYS FROM NOW!!
good work
ReplyDelete