Zambezia (1982), X (ii).REALISM AND THE CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVEL*G.P. KAHARIDepartment of African Languages and Literature, University of ZimbabweTHE CENTENARY OF 'realism'1 as opposed to idealism and naturalism, and as anEnglish literary and critical term, was not celebrated in 1956. However, unknownto the Western reading public and six thousand miles away from England, therewas published in Cape Town, Feso, written by Solomon Mangwiro Mutswairo.The author was the son of a Salvation Army officer at Chikankata in Zambia (thenNorthern Rhodesia). This publication served two purposes, first as an experimentin the reduction to writing of the hitherto unwritten dialects, and second, as anexperiment in the transformation of the traditional folktales, myths and legends,which have an element of fantasy in them, into the Western-type novel form whichaims at realism. The oral art was transformed into the written formŠa processwhich recognizes written art as somehow being an improvement upon the oldspoken narratives. The traditional story-teller, the sarungano, told his tales wellbut Mutswairo, in taking advantage of the latter's techniques and incorporatingthem into English nineteenth-century narrative styles, did better. Since thenBernard Chidzero, Patrick Chakaipa and Paul Chidyausiku have improved uponMutswairo, and Charles Mungoshi and Thompson Tsodzo have excelled all theirpredecessors.In this lecture, 'realism' excludes forms of narrative found in history,biography and autobiography, as these are specifically related to events that didhappen and a description of such events would qualify as being empirical. Inrealism we concern ourselves with that mode of narrative which gives the illusion ofbeing specifically related to the real world. But through art such facts or experiencesof the real world are made to be of a more generalized application. Thisgeneralization of reality assumes a universality which is immediately governed bytwo polarized impulses, the aesthetic and the intellectual; that is, the desire forformal organization and the desire for verisimilitude. A form of aestheticallycontrolled fiction which is not 'realistic' is Chakaipa's Karikoga Gumiremiseve,2 aromance in which the author is after popular simplicity and traditional clarity andwhose hero is idealized. In opposition to this is a form of writing which is*An inaugural lecture delivered before the University of Zimbabwe on 29 April 1982.1 Realism was specifically used as a literary term by the foundation in 1856 ofRealisme, a journaledited by L.E.E. Duranty, See B. Weinberg, French Realism: The Critical Reaction, 1830-1870(London, Modem Language Association of America, 1937), 114. See also I. Watt, The Rise of theNovel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding (Berkeley, Univ. of California Press, 1957), and R.Williams, 'Realism and the contemporary novel', in D. Lodge (ed.), 20th Century Literary Criticism :AReader (London, Longman, 1972), 581-91.2P. Chakaipa, Karikoga Gumiremiseve (Salisbury, Longman, 1958).8586CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELconstrained by political and social facts, and which is more or less specificallyrelated to the world of reality. Such is the didactic form, which is primarilyexpository and can be satirical. This form of 'social realism' is represented byChidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo,3 Chakaipa's Garandichauya4 and Aaron Moyo'ssatire, Ziva Kwawakabva.5 Two types of realism can be distinguished in thesenovels; they are the 'peasant realism' in which the author's vision of life is directedtowards the pre-colonial era, but because he is influenced by traditional folklore hischaracters are representational; and the 'bourgeois realism' or 'social realism"where the author's vision is urban and the characters are illustrative. Therepresentational is mimetic; the illustrative symbolic. 'Psycho-historical realism"emanates from 'bourgeois' or'social realism', as a direct result of English literatureand East and West African literature in English by African writers such as N'gugiand Achebe, The Zimbabwean pioneer in this realism is Mungoshi in his NdikoKupindana Kwamazuva.6'Realism' (or 'realistic') is a problematic literary term; and not without cause.It is used both descriptively and in an evaluative sense and is not exclusivelyaesthetic in its application. The man who says: 'The Government has made arealistic appraisal of its foreign or economic policy' would be approving of theactions of that particular Government, while the man who used unrealistic wouldobviously be implying disapproval. In literature the most ordinary definition is interms of an ordinary, contemporary, everyday reality as opposed to traditionallyheroic, romantic, mythic or legendary subjects.The traditional folktale whose structure has greatly influenced the con-temporary novelist has both realistic and fantastic elements, a fact which explainsthe presence of the fantastic in modern writing despite the modern author's effortsto move quickly towards Western-type realism. In Mutswairo's Feso we have acharacter, Chauruka (the jumper), who takes a gigantic leap over a wall ten feethigh; in Chakaipa's Karikoga Gumiremiseve we have a hero who jumps andholds on to the lion's mane until it hits against the tree and dies, and in a morerecent novel, Nicholas Hamandishe's Sara Ugarike,1 we have a main characterwho steals sheep from a White farmer and dresses them up like human beings.Realism is thus a struggle against idealization and supernaturalism in writing.'Everyday, ordinary reality' is now differently conceived in new techniques, suchas the in medias res; flashbacks and the introduction of first-person narrative aredeveloped to cope with the new kind of social reality. Out of this new situation isborn the kind of novel which creates and judges the quality of an entire way of life interms of the value judgements of the persons in the community. Realism is achieved'B.T.G. Chidzero, Nzvengamutsvairo (Salisbury, Longman, 1957)."P. Chakaipa, Garandichauya (Salisbury, Longman, 1963).5A.C. Moyo, Ziva Kwawakabva (Salisbury, Longman. 1977),6C.L. Mungoshi, Ndiko Kupindana Kwamazuva (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1975).7N.P. Hamandishe, Sara Ugarike (Salisbury, Longman, 1975).G.P, KAHARI8?by the manner in which the author observes his surroundings, selects his materialsurroundings, and orders his materials to make his surroundings more compre-hensible because more patterned.TRADITION AND COLONIZATIONThe British South Africa Company's occupation of the Zimbabwean plateau had acolossal impact on all spheres of social and spiritual life in the country. Art and(oral) literature entered a new stage of development.Traditionalism, with its enthusiasm for the strict 'civic' virtues of villagepeople and its agricultural routines, was on the way out, its place being taken by thenewly arrived missionary teacher, the village store and its Western wares, and thesystem of administration.The missionaries' approach to the concept of individualism was systematic asthey thought that the only way of changing the values of a group of people wasthrough the individual. The missionary was the first to separate the person from hissocial group, thus initiating the process of making unique experiences common, aprocess which also resulted in the person's being alienated from his group. First,there was the new issue of the White man's religion, which taught that all men wereequal in the eyes of God and before the law. Traditional religion amounted to moreor less the same idea except that a Christian penitent could appeal direct to his Godwhereas the traditionalist could appeal to Mwari only through his intermediarygrandfather and his remote great-grandfathers whom he asked to intercede withMwari on his behalf. He worked, in other words, through the community both livingand dead. The one approach is direct, the other indirect. Christianity was moreappealing to the more adventurous individuals, and for the first time in historyparents and their children did not believe in the same God.Secondly, on the intellectual side the minds of the young traditionalists awoketo wider fields of activities. The three R's were taught to individuate the converts.They were taught arithmetical equations in groups, but the task of finding out theanswer was an individual one. They were taught how to write letters, but theapplication of this exercise to real life situations was personal and individualistic.They did everything together for the purposes of doing things as separateindividuals.The small village or farm store represented the economic ideology of freeenterprise introduced with the settlers. For the first timeŠthere is always a firsttime, even todayŠboth the young and the old were in a position to buy articleswhich would be their personal possessions and which would not normally fall underthe jurisdiction of the family. The individual sought employment, first on the mine,then on the farm, and then in the urban area. The remuneration he earned was hispersonal wage which he could dispose of without reference to the traditional groupto which he belonged. The one article of purchase which changed his self-perception is the mirror. The trader sold these by the thousand and the effect was88CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELdevastating. Whereas before the arrival of the trader with his mirror the traditionalisthad only a vague idea about his looks (for he had seen his reflection in the waterdarkly), his self-perception was clearly delineated with the introduction of thetrader's mirror, leading the individual into loving himself more than others or hiscommunity. In Chakaipa's Garandichauya the heroine's love for herself goes toher heart to the utter disregard of her traditional mores. Chakaipa's assertion in thisnovel is that the mirror is the symbol of vanity and immorality.The new system of administration was at one with the other agencies of socialchange, the church and the store. The young girls, whose minds had been opened tonew modes and attitudes, were now in a position to defy their parents in matters oftraditional discipline. They openly refused to marry men who were of their parents'choice and sought protection at mission stations. The boys went to the urban areaswhere they appeared before the Native Commissioner with a friend and married thegirl of their choice and not of their parents' choice. This heralded the death of thetraditional custom which required a young man to get married to a girl whose familybackground was known to his familyŠthe so-called 'mukadzi wematongo'. Thiscustom was bound to collapse as horizontal and vertical social mobility increased.The manner in which the individual saw things was literally the way he wasbeginning to live; his process of communication was no longer the process of hiscommunity. His sharing of common meanings, activities, purposes, offerings, hisreception of new meanings, inevitably led to tensions as well as to achievements ofgrowth and change. This growth and change has in its wake led the new novelwriters to a careful observation and selection of the reality around them. The resultis a new hero and heroine who go against the patterns of social behaviourestablished in their traditional society, frequently involving them in the assimilationand re-interpretation of Western values.THE MATRIX OF THE TRADITIONAL GENRESThe traditional folktale, which had both realistic and fantastic elements, was aproduct of its environment just as is the modem novel. It became the art it was, notbecause it was executed at the behest of and in the service of ritual, as someanthropologists would like to suggest, but simply because it was a way of looking atreality. There is considerable evidence in support of this postulation in other fieldsof art. There is a proliferation of secular art such as we have in the decorativedesigns on pottery and stools and wooden pillows, including the nyora (cuttings) onhuman faces from which we derive the word to write, 'nyora'. Neither of these isritualistic or utilitarian. They seem to indicate that in Shona there appears to besuch a thing as 'art for art's sake' as well as confirming that beauty is not always andnecessarily a handmaid of religion or function. To look for religion as being behindall traditional art is to miss the basic and fundamental interplay of art, audience andthe universe. Art can excite even though religious or social purpose is absent.G.P. KAHARI89The traditional society's world-view fell into two broad divisionsŠthephysical and the metaphysical. The physical world consisted of pastoral and arableland, forests and rivers and mountains with caves and gorges; the metaphysicalconsisted of the familiar milieu and its links with the spiritual involving theinterplay between the living, the dead and the animal world. The stories which theverbal artist told in the evenings of the story-telling seasons when there was nopressure of work were in response to the immediate pressures of his livingconditions. Such stories emerged as folktales, myths and legents. One I rememberfrom my childhood goes as follows:Once upon a time, in a faraway country, rain had not fallen for manyyears and the king of the animals decided to call a meeting to resolve the greatproblem of lack of drinking water. All the animals, big and small, theElephant, Lions, Giraffes and their wives came. The Hyenas, Baboons,Hares and their wives were there, too. One would think the Tortoise, the Frogand their wives were not thereŠstrangely enough they were present. All theanimals one can imagine were present.At the end of the deliberations, which took all day, the meeting resolvedthat all animals would take part in digging a community well. The Hare wouldnot join the rest, saying he had other pressing needs. It was no easy matter todig a well on very hard ground, seeing that rain had not fallen for years. All theanimals took turns, making use of bare hands, sharp-pointed sticks, andstones. Finally, water was found and there was happiness in the community.You will note that the Hare, who did not take part in the project giving thepretext that he had other pressing work to do, was now drawing water from thewell. A meeting was again called to find ways and means of stopping Mr Harefrom drawing water since he had refused to dig the well. The meeting quicklyresolved to place a guard on the well and his task would be to stop Mr Harefrom drawing the water. The Hare was still without drinking water. He had asweet tongue which he used to his advantage and to the dishonour of the guardon duty. Those who refused to be persuaded by his gift of the gab were made totaste the honey he carried in his maguchu (calabashes). The guard would bepersuaded to be tied and gagged (mbiradzakondo) first, if he were really toenjoy the dapurahunanzva (taste of honey). Next day the guard, who wasany one of the big animals, was found lying, and tied with a rope, to thedispleasure of the rest of the well-diggers.Another meeting was called, this time to deal with a matter of nationalimportanceŠto apprehend the Hare and put an end, once and for all, to thisanti-social behaviour. The king said, 'We have come to the end of all our plansto apprehend the HareŠwhat shall we do now?' Various plans were putforward but were found to be impractical. 'Excuse me, sir,' said the Drongo, 'Iwould like to try to bring the Hare to book and to justice.' The rest of the dare(council) looked down and wondered whether the little black bird couldperform miracles. The dare just did not believe him. Others volunteered butwere dismissed as stupid. The big and impressive animals were tried. Andalthough Mr Tortoise and Mr Frog were dismissed as all the animals thoughtthey were just playing the fool, the dare agreed that they try their luck despitetheir size.90CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELThe Tortoise was guarding the well when the Hare (akati tsati kusvika)suddenly and dramatically arrived. 'Go-go-goi' (knock-knock-knock), hesaid. There was no reply from the well. He dipped his hand to draw water andthe Tortoise strongly gripped the Hare's hand. 'I am sorry,' said the Hare,'you have caught a root, don't waste your time.' The Tortoise let go his gripand the Hare, in panic, left without water, for the first time. The animals knewthe Hare would come back soon, and on the following day Mr Frog was onduty guarding the well. The Hare arrived with his honey, as he had done theprevious day. The Frog gripped the Hare's hand hard. The Hare said: 'Youhave caught a tree root.' The Frog asked, with a lisp, 'Does the root of the treehave hairs like the legs of the clever Hare?' The Frog croaked in broaddaylight, as a sign of happiness and also to summon the help of the rest of theanimals. The cleverest had been apprehended by an animal usually despised.A meeting to decide on the fate of the Hare was called and the Hare wasgiven the chance to defend himself. After deliberations lasting all day theHare suggested, 'If you really are to enjoy eating my meat, construct a talltower at the bottom of which you should dig a trench which you should fill withgrass and ashes. Then take me up the tower and drop me into the pit below.This will make my body swell and this will provide enough meat for thecommunity.' The credulous dare did just as the Hare had said. The result wascontrary to expectations as the Hare landed gently and disappeared in thecloud of ashes below.This is where the story-teller died (i.e. the story ends here).The world of the traditional folktale, myth and legend is one belongingessentially to the marvellous and the fantastic. But the novel belongs essentially tothe mimetic with elements of both the marvellous and the fantastic, thusmaintaining its perennial balance arid link between oracy and literacy. If we take theopening of the above fableŠ'Once upon a time, in a faraway country ...'Šwe findit is a formulaic device intended to place the 'text' in its conventional perspective:what will follow will not deal with the commonplace world; the name and identity ofthe narrator are not given, if only to help us appreciate and understand that his'text', and his entire discourse, is both mythical and mystical. This atmosphere isfurther carried by his emotional involvement in the remote past and by his constantuse of the aha- form of the verb. The formulaic endingŠ'This is where the story-teller died'Šneatly shows that the narrator's identity is insignificant. The text iseverything.In this fable the narrative performance involves the distortion of reality bymaking it concrete and finite. Characters in one of the first realistic Shona novels,Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo, cannot be animals because he is concerned withhuman beings in a familiar milieu. The folk narrator temporarily and rituallysuspends everyday law and order. Differences have been resolved, permittingsocial intercourse between the narrator and his audience on one side, and theanimal and the metaphysical worlds of the other. Taboos have been broken and allthings that were separate and divided species have found an intermediary in thenarrator and have thus been united with the rest of God's creation. This suspensionG.P. KAHARI91of the ordinary world has its parallel in Shona society, particularly during thechihwemre or jakwara (threshing party), when practical jokes accompanied byobscenity run riot. Village, family and personal secrets are divulged and the personswho do this are exempt from prosecution, whence the expression, 'chihwerarehachiende kumusha'.Speaking (or singing) in metaphor, riddles and indirect allusions is at the coreof Shona society. This is very much the same case when we come to narrativeperformance as a verbal art. In certain purposeful gatherings 'sadza-Ndinotsvangawosadza' refers to a bride while in others it refers to life as we have in 'unofa ukasiyasadza' which is often associated with the wife's function as cook. In like manner, thefable has a deeper and more symbolical meaning than the one which appears on thesurface. In the first place the characters of the story are personified animals. The'round' and 'flat' characters who feel and speak like human beings are given humanqualities; the lion is strong and muscular; the zebra, firm and elegant; the tortoise,diminutive but courageous and determined; the baboon, sluggish, greedy andboorish; the frog, weak but resolute; and the hare, small, agile and cunning. Thiskind of characterization is carried over into Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo, wherethe three male characters, Samere, Tikana and Matigimu, are placed as against thefemale characters, Sekerai, Nyemwerai and Mhangwa. In this respect the fableembodies the marvellous but anticipates the mimetic.But of course the author's intention and point of view succeed in lifting thestory from the level of the realm of unreality to one that does inform the familiarmilieu. Fantasy in the fable at once disengages itself from the roots and tradition ofthe chihwemre (camivalesque) art: itno longer is only communal but is a universalart form inducting the future adult into the ambiguities, the nature and purpose oflife. The narrator is decidedly didactic and moralistic as he believes in the dynamicnature of human society and he also holds the view that human beings, irrespectiveof their station (hence the various species of animals), must work together in life toproduce beneficial results. Above all, the one human quality which is admired is acommendable presence of mind which enables one to survive in this harsh and cruelworld. The application of the theme in a modem situation is in Chidzero'sNzvengamutsvairo.This particular traditional genre has been chosen because it demonstrates,convincingly, the link that exists between itself and the various genres dealing witha new industrial society. The concept of genre or species is borrowed from thenatural sciences of botany or zoology and there appears to be a qualitativedifference in meaning between genre and specimen, especially when applied tohuman beings or to works of the mind. However, in talking about the genre as aproduct of imagination, the appearance of a new example, the novel, does notnecessarily destroy the main charactersitics. The original is, of course, modifiedbut the properties of the new example are for the most part deducible from thearchetype. The Shona proverb illustrates this point amplyŠ'Mhembwe radzi92CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELinozvarwa ine kazhumu' (the duiker is a species, it is born with a tuft of hair [on itshead]). If we are familiarŠas we are with the traditional genre of the fantastic andthe marvellousŠwith the species of the duiker or that of the tiger, we can deducefrom it the properties of the individual. The birth of a new duiker or tiger does notconfuse us in our definition of what the species is.In like manner, in dealing with any text belonging to 'oral' literature, weshould take into account the properties that it shares with all 'oral' literature. Itwould appear, therefore, that it is difficult to defend the thesis that a piece ofliterary work is entirely original. We must understand that a text is a product of apre-existing literature and that it is also a transformation of that system. It is for thisreason that I have come to conclude that the Shona novel, with all the traditionalgenres possibleŠthe formulaic expressions, the proverb, the riddle, the songŠisnot as amorphous as, possibly, the English novel, but possesses a tight construction.'Genres are precisely those relaying points by which the work assumes a relationwith the universe of literature.'8We arrive at the traditional story-teller's personality, perception of world-view and acumen by a simple process of deduction. We judge him more by what hesays in words than by what he doesŠand Plato thought that poets were only 'theinterpreters of the Gods by whom they were severely possessed'.9 One thing we aresure of is that the stories that he told were definitely not of his composition. He dieda symbolical death at the end of each narration, as evidenced by the formulaicendingŠ'ndopakaflra sarungano' (that is where the story-teller died)Šin order torise again and retell the same story the following night, in different words. We donot know precisely who he is although we have a pretty good idea of his age.Everything about him is mysterious; among other things, his stories' settings, andhis characters. This contributes towards the unrealistic aspect of the folktale. Bethat as it may, he has a warm heart towards his audience, which mainly consists ofchildren whose ages range between seven and thirteen. He speaks their languageand belongs to the same religion. On the other hand we are in possession of hismodern counterparts' personal details. We know of Chakaipa, the Catholic priest,and his novels; Chidzero, the political scientist, and his Nzvengamutsvairo;Tsodzo, the University of Zimbabwe graduate, his Pafunge and his playBabamuniniFrancis,10 At least the battle towards credibility is won even if the warfor realism is being fought. The stories that they write are of their composition, thesettings are clearly stated, and their characters are beginning to bear resemblanceto human characters. Their plots and language are shaped by their new industrialsituation, a further point to the development of a new 'social' or 'bourgeois'realism.8T. Todorov, The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre transl. R. Howard(Ithaca, N.Y., Cornell Univ. Press, 1980), 8.'Quoted in D. Daiches, Critical Approaches to Literature (London, Longman Green, 1964), 8.1(IT.K. Tsodzo, Pafunge (Salisbury, Longman, 1972); Babamunina Francis (Gwelo, MamboPress, 1970).G.P. KAHARI93>*The distinction which I drew in 1972 between the novels whose authors'world-view is directed towards the coming of the Whites (Old World Novels) andthose whose world-view is after the coming of the Whites (New World Novels) is auseful one.11 The two types of settings, which incidentally fall into rural and urbancategories, are distinctly and characteristically Zimbabwean. They affect theunfolding of character and action by providing a Zimbabwean background to both.However, the settings are not clearly elaborated or well delineated, except by a fewauthors like Mutswairo in Feso and Chidyausiku in Nyadzi Dzinokunda Rufu ;12and of course in the novels in English by Shona writers like Stanlake Samkange inThe Mourned One,u by Mutswairo in Feso and Mapondera, Soldier ofZimbabwe,14 and by Mungoshi in Waiting for the Rain.15 In this case theZimbabwean novel in Shona lags behind its counterpart in English and hardlymeasures up to its other counterpart, the West African novel. The Shona novel ismore and more a dramatic statement rather than a demonstration of its settings asrepresenting certain ideals and human values. There is no extended effort todescribe 'scenery' for at least three reasons. First, nature does not appear to beapprehended as an independent reality in its colourful and decorative aspect but asan inseparable, indivisible, and integral part of the entire traditional world.Secondly, traditional narration, which has so influenced the modern novelist, gaveno scenery unless it had a significant role to play in the plot; and thirdly, the authorstake it for granted that the readers are aware of the significance of the settings.Chakaipa in Garandichauya does not elaborate on the contents or wares in thestore because this is notnecessary. What is necessary, however, is the act of sellingthe articles at greatly reduced prices as this leads to Muchaneta's suitor's dismissalfrom his post as shopkeeper. However, in the same book, the author finds itnecessary to give a clear picture of the type of soup and how well it was cooked,because this would show Handisumbe's immoral side, and this is a very importantissue in the didactic aspect of the story. However, John Marangwanda inKumazivandadzoka,16 Chidyausiku in Pfungwa dzaSekuru Mafusire,11 and inthe 'new writing' as represented by Tsodzo in his Pafunge, the description ofrecognizable place-names builds up atmosphere, tone and feeling by concentratingon the physical, moral and intellectual aspects of environment. Except in the OldWorld novels where the stories unfold and are set in the rural areas, the country, inmost Shona novels the rural and urban settings are often juxtaposed to allow themeaning to emerge. Novels written against the background of these conflicting"G.P. Kahari, The Novels of Patrick Chakaipa (Salisbury, Longman, F972).12P. Chidyausiku, Nyadzi Dzinokunda Rufu (Salisbury, Oxford Univ. Press, 1962)."S.J.T. Samkange, The Mourned One (London, Heinemann, 1975).14S.M. Mutswairo, Mapondera, Soldier of Zimbabwe (Washington D.C., Three ContinentsPress, 1974).!5C.L. Mungoshi, Waiting for the Rain (London, Heinemann, 1975).16J.W. Marangwanda, Kumazivandadzoka (Salisbury, Longman, 1959)."P. Chidyausiku, Pfungwa dzaSekuru Mafusire (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1960).94CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELsettings with their respective ideologies manifest numerous different attitudestowards the rise of bourgeois individualism. Because the essential situationinvolves the paradigmatic confrontation between an isolated individual and ahostile society, the novel reflects a world-view defined in terms of the author'ssocial position. The writing thus reflects a gradual but steady movement towards adeeper commitment to realism and to the social issues of the day.'Rural' and 'urban', 'country' and 'city' are powerful words in the experienceof the African people of Zimbabwe. The rural area is where they originally camefromŠthe traditional village. 'The urban area' includes the small mining town andareas occupied by the White farmers, while 'the city' refers to Salisbury (nowHarare) and at times Bulawayo. The arrival of the White man immediately anddramatically transformed the land they occupied into urban areas and theremainder into rural areas.Around the word 'rural' is gathered the idea of a natural and primitive way oflife; of simple virtue, or peace, tranquillity, innocence and contentment. On theother hand the urban areas are linked with the idea of knowledge, sophistication,the administrative base of the capital city, new religious centres, markets, militarybarracks, industrialism, politics, ambition and discontent. The rural is distinctlydifferent from the urban, providing a fundamental opposite. The period between1956 and 1980, however, witnessed a systematic transformation of rural life intourban. This period brought with it an impressive range of novels written in thecountry.The migration of African males, first to the mining centres, secondly tofarming areas and then to the new urban centres in search of employment, disruptedtheir pattern of life. Hitherto, work in the village community had been seasonal butnow it was throughout the year and migrants were no longer able to live with theirwives. Above all, they were forced to work in order to provide the labour for whichthey were paid a pittance out of which they paid various taxes.New modes of transport were introduced. The ox-wagon was the mostpopular, to the extent that a tune, 'Chomtengure', is played by the ZimbabwePolice Band and other pop groups today:SOLO ChomtengureChomtengureCHORUS ChomtengureChomtengureSOLO Mkadzi womutyairi kwira pangoroThe wife of the ox-wagon driver gets onto the wagonCHORUS Aiya, aiyaAiya, AiyaSOLO Ugoti woburuka ngoro yachonaAnd gets down when the wagon is stuck [in the mud]G.P. KAHARI95CHORUSSOLOCHORUSSOLOCHORUSSOLOCHORUSSOLOCHORUSSOLOCHORUSAiya, aiyaAiya, aiyaWanditi mutyari wandioneiYou call me 'the ox-wagon driver'Šwhat have you seenin me?Aiya, aiyaAiya, aiyaWandiona bhurukwa randakapfekaYou see the trousers I am inAiya, aiyaAiya, aiyaMkadzi womutyairi usakumbire doviDo not ask for peanut-butter from the ox-wagon driver's wifeAiya, aiyaAiya, aiyaDovi rake igirisi rengoroHer peanut-butter is the ox-wagon greaseAiya, aiyaAiya, aiyaChomtengureChomtengureChomtengureChomtengureThe plaintive song introduces three images on a long journeyŠ-the tired oxen,the driver's wife and the driver himself walking beside the inspanned oxen. Thesong is played by modern groups for the memories it brings of the long politicaljourney. It reminds people of their enslavement.Missionaries deployed themselves at various strategic points in the country:The Dutch Reformed at Morgenster (1891), the Jesuits at Chishawasha (1892),The American Board Mission at Chikore (1893), the British Methodist Mission atWaddilove (1896), the Anglicans at St Augustine's (1897), and the UnitedMethodist at Old Umtali (1898). The Protestant churches soon translated theBible (1911) and hymns, both of which were used in the fashion of traditionalgenres. Above all, a few discontented Africans set up separatist movements, whichmarked the beginning of Black Consciousness, in an attempt to find their trueidentity before God. They found many biblical passages relevant to the politicalsituation in Zimbabwe. For instance, Sithole recalls Peter Mutandwa's address atNyanyadzi in 1958, in which he quoted Ezekiel 37 : 1-7:The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord,and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones . . .96CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELand, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they werevery dry. And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And Ianswered, O Lord God, thou knowest. Again he said unto me, Prophesy uponthese bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord...So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise,and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.Sithole noted howThis passage had a lot of meaning [to those who listened. To them] the drybones were the Africans who were scattered all over Rhodesia and who hadlost any political coherence since 1896. [They were] impressed by the factthat for the first time Africans were moving up and down the countryorganizing the people to fight for their rights . . . Indeed, the dry bones ofZimbabwe were coming together and God was breathing the breath of life intothem.18The converts took to harmonic singing with grace and ease. They likedantiphonal community singing since it followed in the wake of traditional singingwhich had the alternation of improvised lines and fixed refrains. This, coupled withthe lengthening of words and phrases to suit the African slow tempo, became aunique contribution to the modern protest song. The participation of the soloist inthe verses and of the chorus in singing the refrains reinforced the traditional tuneelements in the song. The performance was repeated again and again until thesingers drove themselves into a trance or violent mood. The interplay of religionand politics is further illustrated in the song sung at Annatoria's funeral in Tsodzo'sPafunge:Zadzisa chirevo chakoFulfil your promiseMwari she wechokwadiTruthful Lord GodOse marudzi enyikaLet all the nations of this worldNgaaone ruponisoSee salvationTarira nyika yokweduLook after our countryUrege kuipa kwayoDeliver it from evilUrege kutsamwa kwayoDeliver it from trials and tribulationI8N. Sithole, Obed Mutezo (Nairobi, Oxford Univ. Press, 1970), 119. For a brief review ofmissionary writing in Shona, see G, Fortune, '75 years of writing in Shona', Zambezia (1969-70), I, i,55-67.G.P. KAHARI97Isingafi mhuri yayoDeliver it from destruction.19Schools in the 1940s often organized concerts to raise funds in order to buy-items for school equipment. At times shows were also organized to compete forshields at centres like Chikaka School in the heart of the Zvimba Reserve. Thesongs which the various 'dumb-bell' choirs sang before the (Native) DistrictCommissioners often criticized the Government to the ironic amusement of the'invited5 guest. One such song that I recall from my childhood was a seriousindictment:CHORUS Kwakatange chibharoFirst there was forced labourKukauya mambureThen we were forbidden the use of nets [for hunting]Kukauya vemigwagwaThen came the roads [more forced labour on]Mombe dzedu dzapera.Our animals are finished [destocked].SOLO Rave gurugugu mbuyaWe are suffering grandmotherCHORUS Rave guruguguWe are suffering.And down in the Chivi Reserve, choirs protested about the same injustice theysuffered:Mombe dzapera naVarungu[Our] beasts have been destocked by the EuropeansTakangoti chenaWhile we helplessly watchHatichaziva chekuitaWe do not know what to doTongotamhurawo.We are suffering too.In Harava, now the Seke Communal Land, choirs sang of political oppression andhumiliation from the 'Boers', the Europeans:Mabhunu anotitambudza MabhunuThe Boers torture us, the BoersAnotitambudzaThey torture us'Tsodzo, Pafunge, 26.98CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELSadza ravo nderekoroniwo MabhunuTheir staple food is com, the BoersNderekeroni.It is com.20The Shona novel cannot be considered independently of such satirical songsbut it is in the settings of the novels, especially when they are urban and with strongdidactic or propagandist overtones, that we enjoy satire at the highest level. Theyreveal an author sensitively aware of the failures and the contradictions exhibitedby the plush habitations of the privileged educated, the 'been-to's' and thenouveaux riches in the urban slums of Gatooma in Chakaipa's Garandichauya; inVhengere (at Rusape) in Julius Chingono's Chipo Changu ;21 in the rural townships(Mhoedoro) in Amos Munjanja's Rina Manyanga Hariputirwi22 and JamesKawara's Ruchiva,23 and in the new residential areas of Westwood and MarimbaPark as portrayed in the latest classic satire, Moyo's Ziva Kwawakabva. Thisseems to be the temporary direction of Shona novel-writing and underscores thatprogressive development towards realism.The domestication of the novel as an art medium in Zimbabwe is highlightedby its background in the context of which character and incident interplay, andman's identity operates in the framework of Zimbabwean history and society.Implicit in this statement is the proposition that a character has a past, a present anda future, the consequences of which are that society, history and the individual, andtheir inter-relationships and inter-dependences, all constitute a system whichaccounts for human reality. It is, therefore, in the novel that we see man beingdefined historically and socially, making it possible for us to see society enteringinto history and history into society. The delineation of character and incident isaffected by the author's point of view which is often in the third-person narrative inall of the Old World and some of the New World novels and in the first-personnarrative with the flashback technique in the 'new writing' series of the New Worldnovels. Samkange in The Mourned One, Tsodzo in Pafunge and Mungoshi inNdiko Kupindana Kwamazuva successfully employ the in medias res technique.This technique, which is also a traditional method of rendering and dramatizingpersonal anecdotes, allows the writer to highlight a single event by ignoring or onlybriefly alluding to other causative events. For instance, the narrator, by using the'shocking' technique says, 'Kufa(kunesu) is dead!' 'What happened?' says20Chidzero, Nzvengamutsvairo, 11. It is interesting to note that at least two prophecies toidrespectively in two Shona novels have been realized, Mutswairo's Feso foretold the coming of the War ofLiberation, which was first fought exactly where Feso is set, in the Centenary area of the Chiweshe TribalTrust Land. Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo foretold the destruction of the Seke Tribal Trust Landbecause of the growth and impact of industrialization: 'Chemai misodzi nyika y aparara' (Cry tears for thecountry, i.e., the traditional way of life is destroyed).21J. Chingono, Chipo Changu (Salisbury, Longman, 1979).22A.M. Manjanja, Rina Manyanga Hariputirwi (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1971)."J. Kawara, Ruchiva (Salisbury, Longman Zimbabwe, 1980).G.P, KAHARI99another. 'He woke up In the morning, took his bicycle, and as he tried to beat thetraffic light he was hit on the side and died instantly.' The entire account whichleads up to instant death is in fact a flashback which places the narrative in itshistorical perspective. We continually adjust our behaviour in the light of formersteps, which is a way of looking into the past to find our present bearings in ourattempts to find ways and means of dealing with the future. Joe Rug in Pafungeremains a mystery until the author takes us back to the time when he was teaching atMharapara Mission, where he met Annatolia, the mother of his daughter whom henow takes to wife. The various situations into which Rug enters really make him the'rounded' figure he is. Thus the narrative within which the technique of flashbackŠnew in this literatureŠis extensively used becomes even more realistic. Flashbackadds a third dimension to an already clear picture.Characters in the New World novels are more realistically and convincinglydrawn than those in the Old World. The reasons are clear. The author, whosevision is directed towards a new industrial situation, is at home in a situation whichinvigorates the individual; and again, in itself the novel form seems to encourage theindividualization of an individual by society. Nyika(dzino) in Chidyausiku'sNyadzi Dzinokunda Rufu became himself after he had been dehumanized anddepersonalized in his native environment because of his inability to have childrenby his wife, Ndaizivei. Muchaneta in Chakaipa's Garandichauya is a fine exampleof what a woman can become in an urban area. Having been drawn to Gatooma bythe lure of adventure, freedom, prosperity, and the shield of anonymity which alsocovered Nyika when he was in Bulawayo, she is 'round' in every sense because sheis convincingly portrayed. -A recent example is found in Kawara's JRttcMva, wherethe school teacher, Zimbangura, finds himself in a community which demands atleast an outward show of respect for traditional concepts of honour and religiousfaith. For him, masking serves a psychological function as he contravenes valueswhich he is supposed to espouse. He thus develops some means of coping with thedichotomy between what he is and what the community thinks he is or ought to be.On the other hand, characterization, in the Old World novels is significantly 'flat',and this is so because they are dealing with a situation where tensions do not arisefrom confrontation with the unfamiliar. The characters are thus representativecaricatures or archetypes interacting in a homogeneous society with a very highdegree of conformity, which would not be found in an industrial society.Characterization in a Westem-type novel depends on individual mobility, mentaland physical interaction. 'Characters in primitive stories are invariably "flat","static" and quite "opaque". The very recurring epithets of formulaic narrative aresigns of flatness in characterization.'24 Be that as it may, just as a good many ofBunyan's characters have a vitality, so have the characters in Chakaipa's'R. Schoies and R. Kellogg, The Nature of Narrative (London, Oxford Univ. Press, 1969), 164.100CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELKarikoga Gumiremiseve, Eric Mavengere's Akanyangira Yaona,25 IgnatiusZvarevashe's Gonawapotera26 and Mutswairo's Feso.There is a parabolic approach to characterization in both the Old World andthe New World novels, but in the latter is overwhelmed and preoccupied withsocial morality, with the lack of tribal (and national) identity. The old and familiartechniques are identified in New World novels. The technique enhances andelaborates the plot. Kurimahufamba (Mr Travel!ing-is-fas-good-asJ-ploughing),the meat vendor in Hamandishe's Sara Ugarike, enhances and elaborates the plot.Samere, in Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo, is the biblical Samuel whose mind andpersonality grow towards the recognition of God, while of his counterparts,Matigimu (Mr Destroyer) is rude, crude and boorish, and Tikana (his nameappears to be without significance) stands between the two. Karikoga inChakaipa's Karikoga Gumuremiseve is the little, lonely, trickster, based on thefolktale character of that name, convincingly and realistically drawn just the sameas some of Dickens' 'flat' characters have succeeded in living. Chikweya (MrCrippled) in Chidy ms'ika" s Karumekangu11 is indeed lame and heavy (chirema).Society looks at him with misgivings. Muchaneta (You-will-tire-of-me) inChakaipa's Garandichauya is a typical character in a typical situation. She enjoysthe wotapu (auto-harp) dance to the satisfaction of herself and of the onlookers inBherina in Gatooma. Her tastes have changed with the introduction of exotic foodsand, above all, she really loves herself more than anyone else, as measured by herreaction to her reflection in the mirror; she will never tire of herself. On the otherhand, her counterpart, Tsisti (Mercy), like Munhamo (In-plight) in Chakaipa'sPfumo reRopa,u treasures moral beauty more than physical excellence.Muchaneta is to Rudo (Love) what Tsitsi is to Nyeesai (Gossip intensely) inKawara's Ruchiva. The two girlfriends in Chidyausiku's Karumekangu havecome up against violence in a world which is decidedly a man's world, andSaraoga's mother in Murangwanda's Kumazivandadzoka encounters a situationin which she is rejected by her own son. Thus characterization, even in the latestpublished novels, is still conceived and patterned on well known and populartraditional folktales, legends and myths as well as on metaphysical assumptions.Francis Hodzongi's Mhosva Inoripwa,19 a work of lyrical beauty, is a notableexample of this.In The Imaginative Writings of Paul Chidyausiku I have postulated atheory on the nature of the Shona plot based on the etymology of the root word -anofrom which we derive zano (plan, singular for mano) as a concept of a humancharacter in a story (rungano). Ngano (singular and plural) is a folktale on which25E.P, Mavengere, Akanyangira Yaona (Salisbury, Longman, 1979).261. Zvarevashe, Gonawapotera (Salisbury, The College Press, 1978)."P. Chidyausiku, Karumekangu (Salisbury, Longman, 1970).28P. Chakaipa, Pfumo reRopa (Salisbury, Longman, 1961),29F.D. Hodzongi, Mhosva Inoripwa (Salisbury, Longman Zimbabwe, 1981).G.P. KAHARI101we superimpose the prefix ru- (rungano).i0 The prefix ru- is one of its secondaryfunctions carrying the idea of length, e.g. ru + oko for hand, and habit, and custom;ruchiva (covetousness), rubo (a persistent habit of stealing, amounting to being ahabitual criminal). Rungano (plot or story) is, therefore, a series of plans designed toenable a character in a situation to escape. In the parabolic folktale quoted above,each (animal) character is or has a plan to execute, and they all formulate a series ofplans which constitute a dynamic and sequential element in the plot. There is,therefore, between character and plot, that mutual dependence without which therewould be no story, its elements of mystery coupled with novelty and familiarity andpredictability.In the light of the above exposition I have, for the time being, distinguishedeight types of plot, as follows:(i) Romance, which is based on traditional folktale and myths. Theexample here is Chakaipa's Karikoga Gumiremiseve.(ii) Epic, a fine example of which is Mutswairo's Feso, a narrative placedbetween the world of ritual legend and the world of history.(iii) Picaresque, which in Shona novels would be defined as the adventures ofa hero, incorporating pseudo-autobiographical and disparate fragmentarymaterials into the life of a reasonably clever and adaptable peasant characterin a new industrial environment. In Spain, where the genre was first used, theterm denoted the adventures of a rogue, knave, or sharper; in France, those ofa beggar or thief; in Germany (Schelm > Afrikaans skellem > Shonachikerema), the adventures of a rogue or adventurer; in Italy, those of arombe (vagrant or rogue). In the picaresque class we have Mutswairo'sMurambiwa Goredeman and Marangwanda's Kumazivandadzoka. BothMurambiwa and Saraoga have been portrayed in a way that will render thework with comic effect without necessarily relinquishing claims to serious-ness of moral values and general verisimilitude.(iv) Satire, which is incompatibility of subject matter with the mode ofwriting accompanied by such minor genres as farce, travesty and burlesqueas are found in Moyo's Ziva Kwawakabva. Indeed most of the social novelshave this satiric element; typical examples are Chakaipa's Garandichauya,Chingono's Chipo Changu, Simbarashe Dzoro's Wandigura Kunorira31and Kawara's Ruchiva.(v) Historical, essentially set in the rural and sometimes in the urban areas,the stories often being of a legendary nature. Often described in archaic andformulaic expressions, characters in these historical novels are invariably'static' and 'opaque'. Examples are Zvarevashe's Gonawapotem,Mavengere's Akanyangira Yaona and Hodzongi's Mhosva Inoripwa.18.30G.P. Kahari, The Imaginative Writings of Paul Chidyausiku (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1975),3!S.M. Mutswairo, Murambiwa Goredema (Cape Town, Oxford Univ. Press, 1959)."S.T. Dzoro, Wandigura Kunorira (Salisbury, Longman Zimbabwe, 1980).102CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVEL(vi) Social, which must be distinguished from its counterpart set in the ruralarea before the coming of the White men. The social novel is set in both ruraland urban areas and is almost always concerned with the disintegration of thefamily as a nucleus of society, the characters often caught up in various snaresand ending by being figuratively bound hand-and-foot just as the Hareliterally was in the allegorical story quoted above. There seems to be aceaseless emphasis on fate, such as we have in Chakaipa's Garandichauyaand Pfumo reRopa, and Kawara's Ruchiva, although a number end on ahappy note, as in Joyce Simango's Zviuya Zviri Mberi,33 in Chidzero'sNzvengamutsvairo, Chingono's Chlpo Changu, Hodzongi's MhosvaInoripwa and Francis Bvindi's Kumuzinda Hakuna JVoko.3*(vii) Thriller, in which the hero has his own morality which has nothing to dowith the ethics that regulate men's behaviour in his society. The story's fieldsof perception unfold in a cinematographic fashion, with a duration of daysrather than years, A good example is Kenneth Mutize's Mary Ponderai35{mil) Detective, which has come about with the rise of gangsterism in theurban area. Good examples of this are Chidyausiku's Karumekangu,EdwardKaugare'sKukumkuraHunge Wapotswa36 and Alexious Lwanda'sZvichakuwanawo.31Yet no novel can be defined strictly as belonging to only one of these categories:Every separable element in a narrative can be said to have its own plot, its ownlittle system of tension and resolution which contributes its bit to the generalsystem. Not only every episode or incident but every paragraph and everysentence has its beginning, middle and end. It is in these small areas . . .that individual achievement may be properly assessed.38DIDACTICISM IN THE NOVELSResearch into the biographies of the authors of these works has revealed that mostof them are or have been engaged as school teachers, which is not particularlysurprising since there were no other employment opportunities open to suchBlacks. This fact tends to give the products of their imagination a didactic tone.This statement could be too presumptuous if it ignored, also, the fact that thedidactic element was a carry-over from Shona culture. The value of a story, so theShona story-tellers think, is embodied in the lesson it conveys. In this respect theShona artists are not alone in their efforts to teach, inform or entertain the teemingschool-going masses who form the main bulk of their readers. The ancients, notablyJ3J. Simango, Zviuya Zvira Mberi (Salisbury, Longman, 1974).34F,L. Bvindi, Kumuzinda Hakuna Woko (Salisbury, Longman Zimbabwe, 1981).3iK. Mutize, Mary Ponderai (Gwelo, ,ambo Press, 1978).36E.W. Kaugare, Kukurukura Hunge Wapotswa (Salisbury, Longman, 1978).37A. Lwanda, Zvichakuwanawo (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1981).38Scholes and Kellogg, The Nature of Narrative, 239,G.P. KAHAR!103the Greek writers and philosophersŠAristophanes, Plato and AristotleŠcon-cerned themselves with the proper function of the poet and his society. Aristophanes,writing in The Frogs has these observations to make:A poet should teach a lesson, make people into better citizens. Schoolboyshave a master to teach them, grown-ups have the poets. From the very earliesttimes the really great poet has been the one who had a useful lesson to teach.We chorus folk two privileges prize:To amuse you citizens and to advise.39The idea of'teaching as well as entertaining' has reverberated throughout theages. English literature, which has so profoundly affected and influenced Shonaauthors, abounds in works of this nature. One has only to read social novels of theeighteenth and nineteenth centuries by Smollett or Dickens to get this impression.We are, therefore, not surprised to find that the Shona novelists are aware of this andthat they, too, insist very firmly on their conception of the poet's proper and rightfulfunction in his society. They endeavour more earnestly to fulfil this functionbecause the age-old grandmothers5 (and grandfathers') social roles have beenaffected by the advent of Christianity, technology, industrialization and the socialmobility attendant on them. This means that the new institutions have taken awaythe influence of elders in society.The Shona novelist's social position is unique. He appears before the publicas both teacher and adviser. For over two decades his ideas, his vision of life or hisoriginal way of looking at life, his fresh and often unorthodox approach to moraland religious issues, Ms clever manipulation of the spoken word turned into awritten form, have captured the attention of the 'intellectuals' of the modern Shonasociety. His style, which is based on the old traditional genres, has shocked thepupils out of their traditional attitudes and helped them to create a modem outlookwhich is nevertheless based on sound Shona traditional values. It is by followingtheir advice, so they annoyingly suggest, that the reader will acquire true wisdomŠwhich is not the same thing as cleverness. Wisdom, they rightly state, thusupholding Shona lore, is intricately bound up with such moral qualities asmoderation and justice (see Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo), with courage andintegrity, such as we encounter in Chakaipa's Karikoga Gumiremiseve and PfumoreRopa. Viewed then in this light, these novels possess a remarkable unity of themesand purpose and their authors are conscious of their responsibilities as 'poets'. Theapparent naivety that goes with these brilliantly 'naive' novels could be a factor intheir greatness. Their strength, ironically, lies in their 'weakness'. Thus the authorsare in line with the traditional view that true art is moral, that it seeks to fulfil, toimprove life, and not to debase it; and that it further seeks to hold at bay and wardoff, at least for the time being, the twilight of the avenging spirits around us. With"Aristophanes, The Frogs, and Other Plays, transl. D. Barrett (Harmondsworth, Penguin,1964), 149-53.104CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELthese noble aims and objectives, which are realized through the application of theart of persuasion at their command, the authors use formulaic and other axiomaticproverbial expressionsŠDzoro's Wandigura Kunorira (you have touched me onthe raw spot); Bvindi's Kumuzinda Hakuna Woko (there is no favouritism at theKing's Palace); Munjanja's Rina Manyanga Hariputirwi (that which has hornscannot be concealedŠevil will out); Hodzongi's Mhosva Inoripwa (crime andcompensation); Kaugare's Kukunikura Hunge Wapotswa (one is in a position totalk if one has been missed); Chingono's Chipo Changu (my giftŠor blessingŠanaccount of a foundling) and Canaan Banana's Chido Chomwoyo Wangu (myheart's delight; a translation from the Ndebele Isponono Sami, 1980).40 There area few examplesŠMungoshi's Ndiko Kupindana Kwamazuva, for instanceŠwhich fall outside the attested framework. The meaning becomes intelligible onlywhen placed against its English translation, The Sequence of Time. Such titles areconceived in English and bora in Shona, showing the ironies of the new situation.Moyo's Ziva Kwawakabva is one of the best of these didactic novels.The New World novels consider the differences that exist between European,especially English, and Shona cultures. When Europe imposes its manners,customs, religious beliefs and moral values on an indigenous way of life, there isbound to be conflict between or among the characters who adhere to either of thetwo systems of culture. These works explore important ideas and values (such ashospitality, for instance), thus forming a new and unique genre. They consider therise of colonial administration, particularly economic organization, industrial-ization and the effect of Christianity, but throughout, their expositions or analysesexhibit the link between oral and written literature.There is therefore a clear distinction between good and evil, and an attempt tosuggest what the author thinks is good. In several novels the main character is thevillain, which shows how far we have moved from the traditional romance.Kawara's Ruchiva, and Chakaipa's Garandichauya and Dzasukwa Mwana-asina-hembe41 are cases in point. Of course not all heroes are villains in modernnovels, as can be seen in Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo.The acquisition of technological civilization is seen to have caused seriousdamage to human relationships. Technology is thus seen to have brought about asystematic movement from an 'ordered' to a 'chaotic' world, so providing asupreme test of character, since people now depend on their inner resources andmoral strength to meet the challenging and hazardous balance in a new world full ofextremes and one in which relatives are not always keen to come to one's assistanceat a time of need. Such a situation enables the authors to understand the vastpotentialities of portraying the dramatic contrasts and tensions of men and womencaught between the two cultures.°C.S. Banana, Chido Chomwoyo Wangu (Gweru, Mambo Press, 1982).'P. Chakaipa, Dzasukwa Mwana-asina-hemhe (Salisbury, Longman, 1967).G.P. KAHARI105The novels, poems and urban songs evaluate their own cultures and moralstandards against the new environment, setting or situation, while all the time thereis an attempt to answer at least the following two questions: What happens to anAfrican when he is confronted with an alien culture? and What happens to theAfricans and their culture under colonialism?The answers to these two questions are many. For instance, the colonialexpression, which is what these imaginative writings are, is a process of self-questioning such as we find in Chakaipa's Garandichauya and DzasukwaMwana-asina-hembe and in Chidyausifai's Nyadzi Dzinokunda Rufu. The sameprocess could be a process of self-discovery which easily leads a people to self-awareness and national identity, which is what all these works are doing. Thecharacters concerned have a perception of cultural differences which leads to thefusion of the best elements from the two cultures. Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairoclearly demonstrates this view:If we agree, at least tentatively, that art does instruct, and if we agree that notall instruction is equally valid... then our quarrel with the moralist position onart comes down to this; we cannot wholeheartedly accept the religious versionof the theory {which seems to influence Chakaipa and all those who write froma Christian point of view] because we are uncomfortable with its first premise,God [instead of primitive society's moral standards, except maybe wherethey are indefensibleŠas in the destruction of one or both of twins]; and wecannot wholeheartedly accept the secular version of the theory because we'reunconvinced that one man's intuition of truth can be proved better thananother's.42LANGUAGE AND STYLELiterature involves us in the study of language and its usage, first in its use forpurposes of imitation, that is for making of fictions, and secondly, when it is used ina way that is aesthetically pleasing, calling our attention to its use as a medium. Thetwo kinds of language are compatible, and in literature inseparable. It is in theapplication of these two kinds of language usage that the author includes 'everyeffect which has to be produced by speech, the sub-divisions beingŠproof andrefutation; the excitation of the feelings such as pity, fear, anger and the like, thesuggestion of importance or its opposite'.43 We get the feeling, tone or atmosphereof the situation he is attempting to create. In the final analysis, the impression orpicture thus drawn comes from the author's choice of words, which then carriesboth the character and events to produce a convincing, realistic and faithful picture.To this end, then, there are two types of general orientation which depend on thestory's settingŠrural or urban; or on a setting which is in neither the rural nor theurban, but the farming community, which enjoys the fruit of both.42J.C. Gardner, On Moral Fiction (New York, Basic Books, 1978), 41."Aristotle, Poetics transl. S.H. Butcher (New York, Hili and Wang, 1961), 93.106CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELThe novels whose characters operate in the rural areas are described inlanguage slow and ponderous, mythical and ritual, because the rhythm of events isin sympathy with the season's determined movements. In like manner, therefore,the feeling and tone of Chakaipa's Karikoga^ Gumiremiseve and Pfumo reRopa,Giles Kuimba's Tambaoga Mwanangu,44 Francis Mugugu'sJekanyika,45 DavidChiguvare's Kutonhodzwa kwaChauruka,46 Zvarevashe's Gonawapotera, andMavengere's Akanyangira Yaona and Hodzongi's Mhosva Inoripwa are legend-ary, mythical, totemic and ritualistic, and this in turn determines (among otherthings) our approach. On the other hand, the pace of events in the urban areas is notimmediately affected by the natural rhythm. Most of the factories continue toproduce articles irrespective of the year's seasons. Time as well as space isaccurately measured to avoid waste. Everything is well demarcated and so are theindividual women and men who appear in the New World novels. There are fewseasonal images in such novels. There is, therefore, a tremendous feeling of liberty,freedom and equalityŠa kind of 'new constitution' feelingŠnever experiencedbefore, and this can be felt in the language. It is this kind of Christian feeling, even aChristian vocabulary (as not many people would like to admit), that broughtaboutŠamong other forces of courseŠ-the War of Liberation in Zimbabwe.As the novels are on all aspects of social life in the country, the tones andfeelings are equally wide-ranging. The one tone which is shared by authors,whether writing from a Christian or Shona cultural point of view is that of moralisticpreachingŠand language points to the moral purpose. Marangwanda's Kuma-zivandadzoka from beginning to end is pathetic; Moyo's Ziva Kwawakabva ishilarious, satiric and comic; Emmanuel Ribeiro's Muchadura41 is tragic; Chidzero'sNzvengamutsvairo provides a picture of lyrical appeal as we travel along a terrainof rugged beauty in the Seke Tribal Trust Land; and in Tsodzo's Pafunge we attainsublime heights as we move from the serene mission station through thetempestuous winds which uproot the five huge trees symbolizing the fall of the fivefamilies concerned in the story. There are moments of comic relief; there aremoments of all sorts of different feelings provoked by the author's choice of words,bringing in profundity or banality on either side of the novel's spectrum. In Pafungesentences are long in contemplative situations and short and snappy in aggressivescenes.It would also appear, as with all the authors, that there are scenes andsituations which need an English type of grammatical construction, especially thesentence which begins with a gerund. For instance, 'Achifunga kudai...' (Thinkingin this manner. . .). Other parts of speech, too, are used, such as the ideophonewhich Kuimba has used in its traditional form in his Gehena Harina Moto4%44G. Kuimba, Tambaoga Mwanangu (Salisbury, Longman, 1963),45F.C. Mugugu, Jekanyika (Salisbury, The College Press, 1968).4*D.E. Chiguvare, Kutonhodzwa kwaChauruka (Salisbury, The College Press, 1976).41E.F, Ribeiro, Muchadura (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1967).48G. Kuimba, Gehena Harina Moto (Salisbury, Longman, 1965).G.P. KAHARI107Language has thus been used most imaginatively, to the extent that what Doke in1929 thought was not a feature of ShonaŠpalatalizationŠhas been found to exist,as in murume > murunyana (a young husband, i.e., the wife's brother-in-law). Inthis respect literature is in the service of linguistics, for it must be evident that theevolution of usage seen in the novels must reflect an idiom or register accessible tothe reader. As Sartre, the French philosopher, explains in What is Litemturel:'The operation of writing implies that of reading as its dialectical correlative... It isthe conjoint effort of author and reader which brings upon the scene that concreteand imaginary object which is the work of the mind.549CONCLUSIONThe sarungano (story-teller) was responsible for the dissemination of the storieswhich he told to the children and, occasionally, to the adult members of Mscommunity. His age and wisdom qualified him to be the custodian of thecommunity's moral values. It was not unusual for women to act in this capacitysince they had the knack and finesse to deal with developing minds (latter-daycircumstances deprived them of this traditional role but they are now coming on tothe scene again, as evidenced by Mrs Simango and others). It would appear,however, that women story-tellers could tell only certain stories, leaving others tothe male folk. This is understandable in view of the fact that there were certain jobsthey alone could do and stories reflecting such roles could rightly be told by them.In th;s case they told stories with 'domestic' settings while the men told nganodzomusango (tales of the woods), as they were hunters. There were stories whichcould be told only to selected audiences for the moral values embodied in them.This indeed is the beginning of (voluntary) censorship found in modern states. TheShona community's reasons for introducing this censorship were different fromthose of Plato, set forth in Book II of the Republic, in which he insists that storiestold to children should be morally edifying and that they should never suggestwrong ideas. For these and other reasons Plato, who realized that poets had a giftwhich was not necessarily an art, thought that they (poets, by which he meantwriters of imaginative stories) should not be allowed to come anywhere nearchildren since what they say 'feeds and waters the passions instead of drying themup'.50 The ideas of the Shona sarungano are more advanced and progressive. Hethought and acted otherwise.Realism in the contemporary novel cannot be understood outside itshistorical and social perspective. And this contextual analysis must necessarilyrecognize the role of such national institutions and services as the LiteratureBureau, certain publishing houses, the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation, theNational Arts Council, the National Archives and the University of Zimbabwe.""Quoted in D. Lodge, The Modes of Modem Writing: Metaphor, Metonymy and the Typologyof Modem Literature (London, Edward Arnold, 1979), 9.50Quoted in Daiches, Critical Approaches to Literature, 19.108CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELThe Literature Bureau, established in 1954,51 together with the publishinghouses (Longman (Zimbabwe), the College Press and Mambo Press, all of whichsprang up before the period beginning 1956), has been responsible for thedissemination of Shona literature, particularly the novel. After Feso, the novelplayed a role of increasing importance in the literary sense. The annual productionof works of fiction increased by leaps and bounds from 124,000 copies at the timewhen I wrote The Novels of Patrick Chakaipa to over 229,093 copies ten yearslaterŠan increase of over 84 per cent, making an annual increase of over 7 per cent.The novels themselves increased in number from 25 in 1972 to 89 in 1982Šanincrease of 256 per cent, representing an annual increase of 25.6 per cent. Thequantitative increase did not necessarily match the increase in quality. With a fewexceptions the novels of the second decade, though occasionally of some interest asevidence of life of the time, had very little literary merit. Much of this lack of meritreveals only too plainly the pressures towards literary degradation which wereexerted by the booksellers in their efforts to meet the literate public's uncriticaldemands; few are very goodŠChidzero, Chakaipa, Chidyausiku, TsodzoŠbutseveral still rose above the level of mediocrity. Emmanuel Zanza, for example, hasmerit as a social reporter and humorist, but there are flaws in the central situationsand the general structure of his novel.52 Tsodzo, on the other hand, offers veryprovocative literary solutions to the major formal problems which had been raisedby his predecessors. He found a way of reconciling Mutswairo's realism ofpresentation with the realism in assessing internal and external approaches tocharacter shown by Chakaipa, Chidyausiku and Chidzero. There is, therefore, areal breakdown of both the traditional narrative method, and of the socialbackground, facing more squarely, for example, the social and moral problemsraised by economic individualism and the bourgeois quest for improved status in anew situation. Tsodzo's picture of the proper norms of the social system is similarto that of Mungoshi, especially in the type of life portrayed in Mungoshi'sMakunun'unu Maodzamwovo,53 although its application to characters and theexploitation of their situation is, by and large, more selective, complicated, seriousand discriminating. The shift in emphasis is away from the novel as a mere romance(Chakaipa's Karikoga GumiremiseveŁ, for example), interested in recreation oramusement, towards the novel as a genre capable of handling the human conditionin its totality. The Shona novel writers are beginning to be more and more aware ofthe link between the reality of created things and the imitative reality of art. There isa strong link with the English type of realism which has come to mean, like the word'modernism', an experimentation in the arts as an expression of reality.If the above is to be taken as the norm, then, a good many books that haveappeared on the market ought not to have been published or to have seen the light of51Kahari, The Novels of Patrick Chakaipa, 1-4.32E,H. Zanza, Hunde Yorufu (Salisbury, Longman, 1971)."C.L. Mungoshi, Makunun'unu Maodzamwoyo (Salisbury, The College Press, 1970).G.P, KAHARI109day. Time is fast coming when the publishing houses will cease to profit by theignorance of an uncritical reading public.The Literature Bureau has been receptive in the past, and I hope that with thesupport of the Government, which is equally receptive to the wishes of the people, itwill be even more vigilant to see that bad books do not reach the public. One way ofdoing this is to let the publishing houses do this work; then the Literature Bureauwill not be blamed for allowing bad novels to be published. The publishing housesshould compete among themselves.The Shona novel is connected with various institutionsŠthe National ArtsCouncil of Zimbabwe, the National Archives, and the Zimbabwe BroadcastingCorporationŠbecause it is a product of the human mind, and art. And theUniversity of Zimbabwe, which takes cognizance of this fact, is also connectedwith these institutions. As a Department of African Languages and Literature, weare properly in the business of explaining and evaluating these; in other words, wetranslate the concrete into the abstract and vice versa, and this is an importantfunction to assume in a new state. In realizing the form of the Shona novelŠthetraditional folktale, myths, legends, songs, proverbs, riddles, and generally its pastas well as its present backgroundŠthe Department is well equipped to handle thesegenres as separate issues of one greater form, the novel. There is a team theselection of which was the responsibility of the first incumbent of the Chair, andHead of the Department of African Languages, George Fortune, to whom I amindebted. He was a man of great scholarship, a man with tremendous vision, whichmade it possible for him to organize the study of the Shona language with regard toits two functions. Notably, he saw language as the ultimate reality to which there isno outside appeal. Truth and falsehood lie in words, with special reference to theShona novel. In his honour and in conformity with the foundations that he laid in theDepartment, we have changed our name to 'Department of African Languages andLiterature' to reflect this.The contemporary Shona novel, from Mutswairo's Feso to the latest, sayBvindi's Kumuzinda Hakuna Woko or Hodzongi's Mhosva Inoripwa, has in aperiod of twenty-five years travelled on a progressive journey into innovation. Ithas been on the road to that realism which is part of the historical process, andthrough which it is making a desperate bid to dissociate itself from traditionalassumptions. This style of writing is influenced a great deal by that of twentieth-century English novel writing. Chidzero's Nzvengamutsvairo has already achievedthis realism when it was followed and carried to its logical conclusion byMungoshi's Ndiko Kupindana Kwamazuva, Tsodzo's Pafunge and Samkange'snovel in English, The Mourned One, Realism is difficult to define: it is the writer'sattitude of mind which enables him to render the material in his story realistically,convincingly and faithfully. The fathers of Shona literature, Mutswairo, Chakaipaand Chidyausiku, have earned themselves a deserved and secure literaryimmortality. They have expressed their own sense of life with commendable110CONTEMPORARY SHONA NOVELexpertise, completeness and conviction. This was taken up by their successors,adding to the sum total of the contribution of realism to the contemporary Shonanovel. With such sure foundations the Shona novel will become a vital part of thenew Zimbabwean nation.