In which Lauren Beukes' "Zoo City" wins the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2011!!

It is May in Harare, which means only one thing ... the Harare International Festival of the Arts is in town! I will be blogging at length about HIFA, but first, I want to share some thrilling news about one of my favourite writers and people.

My friend Lauren Beukes has just won the 2011 edition of the Arthur C. Clarke award for her second novel, Zoo City! Yes indeedy! This teeny little South African half-pint beat off competition from Richard Powers and Patrick Ness among others. Zoo City is a dream of a novel, fast-paced, spooky atmosphere, a plot that won't let up, and is intelligent and smart without being ponderous. I loved this novel, and am really happy that it is getting the recognition it deserves ... it has been shortlisted for three other awards so far. The chief value of awards is that they often bring books that might otherwise go unnoticedto a bigger public, and so I am really pleased that Lauren's book will go further because of this award.

And it could not have happened to a nicer person. Lauren is the bee's knees, she is. She is funny, smart, cool, and normal. And believe me, when it comes to writers, normal is a compliment:) I met her when she launched my book in Cape Town back in 2009, we clicked at once, so for me, this is a celebration both of a brilliant book and a lovely and true friend. Buy the book, I promise, you will not regret it.

Totutuma! Happy Independence Day Zimbabwe!

Some people think Zimbabwe and then immediately Mugabe. I think Zim and Oliver Mtukudzi, the man with the weeping guitar and crackly voice, springs immediately to mind. He is our undeclared laureate, the man who brought untold pleasure to millions during Zimbabwe’s difficult decade, a humble ambassador who has given far more than he has taken. Today is Zimbabwe’s 31st independence day and I share with you Oliver’s seminal Totutuma at the link below. The translation of this song on the album Tsivo is "We celebrate". A more poetic translation would be "We overflow with pride and joyousness", which I certainly do when I listen to Oliver. Happy independence day, Zimbabwe!

Totutuma!

Photo of Oliver from the blog PhotoDelusions - http://photodelusions.wordpress.com.

In which I Reveal my Next Project: A Book About Mugabe

I am writing a book about Mugabe. Yes, you heard it here first. I am writing a book about my encounters with Mugabe. It is going to make my name, it is, because Mugabe is the World’s Worst Dictator, and History’s Second Worst Man, Second Only to Hitler. Was there a poll, I hear you ask? Does it matter? If Mugabe did not exist, the Western media would have to make him up.

Now, about my book. I have decided to make myself white because then it will DEFINITELY be turned into a movie. If you are an African mass-murderer and or dictator, they will make a movie about you if you kill enough people but they need a white foil who comes to Africa to discover himself through meeting you and gazing with angst at the African landscape. The book will have a great big lolloping picture of him on the cover. It will be called Cocktails with Mugabe because cocktails sound so very glam and decadent, and if you then add with Mugabe you heighten the decandence by a factor of the square root of infinite, and, as a bonus, you get a little frisson of dark African glamour with olives on the side. Black olives.

My book is based on reality - nothing says authentic more than the words “based on a true story”. I once went to a cocktail party where Mugabe stood in the corner, surrounded by bodyguards. I tried to get close enough to talk to him, but his bodyguards approached menacingly and I went the other way. But that was not the only time I met him. I had talked to him a few years before, when I graduated, or, rather, he had talked to me. I knelt on a padded footstool in my graduation gown. He tapped me on the head with a little black board and said “Congratulations”.

Is that all, I hear you say.

I tell you, I can make a whole book out those encounters. Was that loneliness that I saw in his eyes as his bodyguards moved from him, or a crazed self-satisfied look? Was that a genocidal snarl I heard in his voice when he said “Congratulations” ? And what to make of the fact that he said “Congratulations” and not “Makorokoto” or “Amhlope?” Does this say anything at all about his love of the Queen and his later anger at Britain’s great betrayal? Was that the falling light in the Great Hall of the University of Zimbabwe on his face or the merest shadow of a Hitler moustache, foreshadowing the terror and the fear that was to come? Was it the light? Or was it a murderous glint from a murderous mind ?

Yes, I am writing a book on Mugabe.

It is going to be huge.

A perfectly fine example of the bullshit factor in publishing at work

For many reasons that are too tedious to go into, I decided almost as soon as I entered it that that the world of writers and publishing is one that I want only to make sporadic forays into – it can never be my whole world. Reading and writing, it turns out, are very different from publishing, and books, it would appear, are so often more rewarding, more interesting, heck, more human, than some of the people who write them. There is so much bullshit in this particular world. I hasten to say that I am luckier than most because the people I work with are totally bullshit free:)

For a full blast of the bullshit factor in publishing, look no further than this appraisal by editor Justine Tal Goldberg of a David Foster Wallace poem written when he was about nine. It is, frankly, not a good poem, at best, it is average, even for a kid. But to Ms Goldberg, this little poem is “powerful stuff”. It is of “nuanced construction”. It “indicates that the young Wallace was attuned to the speech patterns of the people around him, namely his parents and teacher.” In the poem, “he is already exhibiting the masterful grasp of language for which he would later become famous.”

Read the poem here and judge for yourselves.

Everyone is pretty much rolling their eyes in the comments to the piece, as, I am sure, would DFW, who, from all accounts, was a modest man who would have found this sycophancy deeply embarrassing. As someone on the comments said:

“No more DFW please. Ever. Or at least until we've forgotten who he is and can look at his writing with some kind of balance. I've enjoyed some of his writing very much. But has the output of any other writer ever been subjected to such absurd hyperbole?”

Quite.

The Harare City Library Comes to the Book Cafe: Join Us for A World Book and Copyright Day Celebration

World Book and Copyright Day is on 23 April 2011. To celebrate it, I will be hosting a panel on literacy and reading in Zimbabwe, with fellow writers Ian Holding (Unfeeling, Of Beasts and Beings) and Blessing Musariri (A Tree’s Story, Rufaro’s Day, The Mystery of Rukhodzi Mountain). Daniel Mandishona (White Gods, Black Demons) was supposed to join us, but could not make it, so his publisher Murray McCartney of Weaver Press will join us in his place. If you are in Harare, please come to the Book Café tomorrow night, from 5:30. For more detail, see the press release below from the Book Café. As the statement says, this is the first in a series of events hosted jointly by the Harare City Library (whose board I chair) and the Book Café.

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In April, Zimbabwe joins the world in celebrating World Book and Copyright Day, which presents an opportunity to tackle issues which help maintain the world of books alive.

On April 12, the early evening Book Cafe literary discussion will look at ‘Reading in Zimbabwe’ led by Petina Gappah, with writers Ian Holding, Daniel Mandishona and Blessing Musariri. It will discuss the importance and pleasures of reading, and explore how Zimbabwe can truly become a literate country.


In 2010, the UN placed Zimbabwe at the top of the adult literacy table in Africa with a 92 per cent adult literacy rate. But what is the meaning of literacy in a country where reading has become an expense?

Petina Gappah is a Zimbabwean writer whose short fiction and essays have been published in eight countries. Her story collection, An Elegy for Easterly published in 2009 has taken her across the world to various literary events. The book won the Guardian First Book Award in 2009.

Petina, the Chairperson of the Harare City Library Management Committee, is determined to make a difference, and this discussion is the first presentation hosted jointly between the library and Pamberi Trust.

Pamberi Trust projects officer Extra–Blessings Kuchera who is organizing the 
discussion said, “We look forward to welcoming Petina to Book Café on Tuesday 12 April. We hope this collaboration with the Harare City Library is the beginning of more activities which will help to develop literature in Zimbabwe.”