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The sixth book in the Short Writings series, giving the views of Zimbabwean writers since the start of the twenty-first century

Reviews

Reviewed by Philani A. Nyoni

Amabooks have unveiled a new collection of short stories boasting some of Zimbabwe's literary heavyweights in the form of Togara Muzanenhamo, Blessing Musarira, Raisedon Baya, Barbara Mhangami-Ruwende, Christopher Mlalazi, Ignatius Mabasa, Tendai Huchu, Melissa Tandiwe Myambo and Bongani Kona. Bryony Rheam gives us the title-piece of the anthology.

The selection opens with Muzanenhamo. His description unmasks him as a poet as he spins a lonely tale that surfs the ridges of life and death and some of the tragedies that follow the Law of Causality. He is blissfully descriptive, overly wordy at times, but that is a judgement of preference. My verdict will hang it a strong, enigmatic opening.

The humorist Zana Mthimkhulu asks What's In A Name?. Not about a rose or any other flower as one's Shakespearean learning might suggest; rather a puppy that has been named 'Ndevuziqamulamankomitsho' after a guerrilla. The laughs start unraveling quick but slight as he interrogates history, the social legacy of the revolution and culture in the urban setting, as well as 'democracy done the African way'. Mthimkhulu offers us, the native reader, an opportunity to laugh at ourselves.

Bryony Rheam is an excellent prosist as her past works will attest; and true to her form her realm is melancholic grey. This time the story revolves around a writer raised in Zimbabwe now living in Austrailia. He must return home, to Bulawayo, for his father's funeral. The story cuts into the murky spectrum of nationality and identity, sense of belonging and history.

While most of John Eppel's most recognised work has been political, largely satirical, his latest works throb with fatal beauty, more concerned with the pastoral scene, birds and classical music. The Beauty of the Lilies is a fine, sublime composition retelling the meeting of April Day whose demise is the subject of the narrative and the finest tenor the world has ever seen in the form of Thulani Khumalo. The latter survived the annihilation of his family by fire after his uncle was accused by 'men with red hats' (an inference to the North Korean trained Fifth Brigade) of being a dissident. In true form Eppel is sure and relentless, much of this story moves by suggestion and sublimity.

This is the part where thread-bare-laundered and darned phrases like 'rich tapestry' fly off from the reviewer's pen. The work is well selected and highly representative of Zimbabwean society, experience, imagination and thought from the urban to the rural setting all the way to the diaspora; lending insight into the lives and trials of Zimbabweans of diverse dispositions. There are awkward sexual encounters, drinking stories, narratives of strange books and everything else 'Zimbabwean' in-between.

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