Renowned short story writer, Memory Chirere walked away with his third National Arts Merit Award (NAMA) gong at the recently held 2015 ceremony for his book, ‘Bhuku Risina Basa Nekuti Rakanyorwa Masikati’ which was voted the best in the Outstanding Fiction Book category.
The book comprises of 69 poems that were written during a twenty year period.
“This book is unique in the sense that I never sat down to say I am writing poems that I would want to publish,” said Chirere to the Zimbo Jam. “These poems came to me as thoughts and experiences over the years and I would just find myself scribbling down words on paper. All the poems in this book were written based on my personal experiences.”
“I would write even sitting at the back seat of a kombi, at a wedding, or a funeral. I would write every time.
“I ended up having 100 poems and I did not know what to do with them, whether to throw them away or just keep them in a big khaki envelope packed somewhere in the house.
“That’s when, with the help of Ignatius Mabasa I decided to compile and arrange 69 of the 100 poems and hence the title ‘Bhuku risina basa nekuti rakanyorwa masikati’,” revealed Chirere.
The University of Zimbabwe lecturer in the department of English is very keen on writing short stories and has had his stories published in other books such as ‘Nomore Plastic Balls’ which is a collection of many stories by various authors and ‘Somewhere in this country’ which is a current Advanced Level set text book.
“This book is my diary for the past twenty years. It’s a true reflection of all the events that have happened in my life ever since I was twenty-five and at times I wrote to settle the demons in my mind as a result, every poem has its own emotions,” said Chirere.
Chirere also went on further to comment on the reading culture in the country.
“The reading culture in the country is healthy, what’s not there is the buying of literature culture and this has been greatly affected by the ailing economic climate. This I feel is due to the fact that the locally produced books are expensive.
“Good books in Zimbabwe cost roughly $20 which is a lot of money to part with to purchase a book. I have had the privilege of going to Namibia and I saw my books selling for half the Zimbabwean price and I bought copies there because even as the author I cannot afford the price here.”
The father of two, nine year old daughter Shasha, and four year old son Kudekara, is currently reworking his first award winning short stories book ‘Tudikidiki’ which won a NAMA in 2007.
Memory Chirere is considered to be a leading literary voice in Zimbabwe. Besides ‘Bhuku Risina Basa Nekuti Rakanyorwa Masikati’, he has also published two other short story books, ‘Tudikidik’i (2007) and ‘Toriro and his Goats and Other Stories’ (2010) which have both won NAMA awards. Beyond his creative work, Chirere has compiled and edited various other short story books namely, Totanga Patsva and Children Writing Zimbabwe’.