Zambezia (1987), XIV (ii).ESSAY REVIEWWORDS AS BULLETS:THE WRITINGS OF DAMBUDZO MARECHERA*[Biographical note: Dambudzo Marechera, perhaps Zimbabwe's best-known writer,died in Harare on 18 August 1987, He was born on 4 June 1952 in Vengere Townshipnear Rusape. The son of a truck-driver, he attended various mission schools and enteredthe University of Rhodesia in 1972 to study English literature. In 1973, he was sent downwith other student leaders who were involved in protest demonstrations. He was able toleave the country secretly and continued his studies at New College, Oxford, from 1974,Faced with the choice of undergoing voluntary psychiatric treatment or leaving theCollege, Marechera gave up his studies in 1976. He lived in Britain, mainly amongLondon's 'alternative' community, as a free-lance writer, without a permanent home. Hewas writer-in-residence at the University of Sheffield in 1978, and gave readings at theHorizonte Festival in West Berlin in 1979. He returned to independent Zimbabwe in1982, where he lived as a free-lance writer until his death. He won the Guardian FictionPrize for his first book, The House of Hunger, in 1979],Dambudzo Marechera is an outsider. He cannot be included in any of thecategories into which modern African literature is currently divided: his writingshave nothing in common with the various forms of anti-coionial or anti-neocolonial protest literature, nor can they be interpreted as being an expressionof the identity-crisis suffered by an African exiled in Europe.Marechera refuses to identify himself with any particular race, culture ornation; he is an extreme individualist, an anarchistic thinker. He rejects social andstate regimentation Š be it in colonial Rhodesia, in England, or in independentZimbabwe; the freedom of the individual is of the utmost importance. In this he isuncompromising, and this is how he tries to live.Thus he embodies for Europeans the almost nostalgic image of the writer-tramp, something less familiar to Africans, the Steppenwolf who survives on thefringe of society, always poor, homeless and alone, sleeping on park benches,spending on drink what little he occasionally earns with his publications. It is notnecessary to have read Marechera to have heard of him, since his every publicappearance is an opportunity for him to attack and ridicule the Establishment. Atthe ceremony in London at which he was awarded the Guardian Fiction Prize in1979, he hurled cups and plates at the chandeliers, finding the whole affairhypocritical and feeling that no one really understood him.* The original German version of this review appeared in Krittiches Lexikon zur Fremd-sprachigen Gegenwartsttteratur (Munich, Edition Text + Kritik, 1987), XIII, and this translationappears with permission. It has been translated by Orlaith Kelly and Roger Stringer, with theassistance of the author.113114WORDS AS BULLETSIt would seem that Marechera finds himself always persecuted, endlesslypursued. With his unusually thin skin, he can only survive the constant,threatening blows of the outside world through the powerful and magicalexorcism of the written word. This makes his language strikingly immediate andintense, with exceptionally vivid imaginative power. The 'power' of his words,always highlighted by critics, can be taken quite literally: with the power of theword and of the imagination, he seeks to counter the manifestation of power (i.e.violence) which he meets in all its forms in his own life, and which he abhors andfears more than anything else.In The House of'Hunger (1978), Marechera describes his first brushes withthe violence which marked him for life Š the daily violence of the township (inwhat was then Rhodesia) where he grew up. His mother worked unceasingly tosend the nine children to school; his father, a truck-driver, an alcoholic, was killedin a road accident when Marechera was eleven years old. The 'House of Hunger'came to symbolize for him the environment of poverty, hunger and filth, theloneliness and brutality of all human relations. The sensitive and gifted boy fledfrom this squalor into the world of books, of fantasy, of dreams:I acquired the ability to simply go on reading even while my father and mother werefighting, or while someone was being mugged just outside the house. I would simply justconcentrate, knowing very well about the horrifying circumstances around me. A totalescapism.1European literature and the English language became his means of escape. As theyears passed, he acquired an extensive and thorough knowledge of worldliteratures, and his command of English became very sophisticated. His mothertongue, Shona, however, he associates with the misery and the material andspiritual poverty of his childhood, rejecting it and coming to hate it as much as hehates everything relating to tradition, family, and African origins.The House of Hunger consists of nine stories, so linked in their themes thatthe book can certainly pass as a novel, as Doris Lessing writes in her critique.2 Thetitle story, by far the longest in the book and described by Marechera as a novella,is developed from its first words: T got my things and left.'3 The rest of the action isconfined to this one day, during which the first-person narrator meets friends atthe beer-hall and in a bar. Again and again, this ostensibly weak storyline isinterrupted by the memories and reflections which accompany his departure fromthe House of Hunger, from childhood and youth; in this way, the boundaries of1 'Escape from the House of Hunger' [interview with Marechera by G. Alagiah], South (Dec.1984), 10.2 D. Lessing, 'A cultural tug-of-war', Books and Bookmen (1979), XXIV, ix, 62-3.3 D. Marechera, The House of Hunger (London, Heinemann, 1978; Harare, ZimbabwePublishing House, 1982), 1.FLORA VEIT-WILD115time shift constantly, present conversations passing unbroken through flashbacksand the narrator's thoughts, and the lines blur between dream and reality. In amixture of autobiography and fiction^ Marechera describes not only hischildhood in the township but also the violent behaviour of his fellow pupils atone of the best mission-schools in the country; the brutality of White students,who beat up the narrator and his White girl-friend on the campus of theUniversity of Rhodesia; his brutal interrogation by the Rhodesian police beforefleeing to England; the African students who were police informers and who weresolely intent upon improving their social position. He returns again and again tothe mood that characterized his generation of students in Rhodesia at thebeginning of the 1970s Š the search for freedom by students who at the sametime were paralysed by an all-embracing, corrosive moral disintegration anddecayThere were no conscious farewells to adolescence for the emptiness was deep-seated inthe gut. We knew that before us lay another vast emptiness whose appetite for things livingwas at best wolfish. Life stretched out like a series of hunger-scoured hovels stretchingendlessly towards the horizon. One's mind became the grimy rooms, the dusty cobwebs inwhich the minute skeletons of one's childhood were forever in the spidery grip thatstretched out to include not only the very stones upon which one walked but also the starswhich glittered vaguely upon the stench of our lives. Gut-rot, that was what one steadilybecame.4The other stories in the book take up motifs introduced in the main story, butalso describe scenes and experiences from the time that Marechera spent as astudent at New College, Oxtord: 1 he only Black student in his group, in 'BlackSkin, What Mask', he tries to meet the intense pressures at a British university richin tradition by denying his roots with the use of skin-lightening creams, bywearing wigs, in his clothing and accent, by going out with White girls Š until heends up slashing his wrists. Another story, 'The Writer's Grain', reflects anightmarish surrealism: a boy who has lost his memory is subjected to brutallygrotesque brain-washing by 'Mr Warthog', which is reminiscent of AnthonyBurgess's A Clockwork Orange (1962). In the lyrical fairy-tale narrative of'Protista', the man-fish, Marechera makes use of magic symbolism from themyths of his people to create a tender counterpart to the menacing image ofWoman in 'The House of Hunger': Maria the huntress represents love, strengthand fertility; without her, the country is threatened by drought, and the solitaryand forsaken man (the narrator) is threatened by the death-bringing man-fishwho lives in the depths of the river.The writer's paranoia and his gradual mental breakdown pervade the wholebook: at the mission-school he suffers from hallucinations and has a nervousbreakdown; later, a monkey looks back at him out of the mirror to jeer at him; the4 Ibid., 3-4.116WORDS AS BULLETSprofessor of literature meets his doppelganger at the same time that his wife isbeing unfaithful to him with one of his students called Marechera. All these aresymbols of a split personality, a theme taken up and explored further inMarechera's second book, Black Sunlight (1980), Writing appears to be the onlyway in which he can combat his own disintegration: the poems become thesymbolic 'stitches', constantly recurring in The House of Hunger, which keep thenarrator (i.e. the author) in. one piece:Afterwards they came to take out the stitches from the wound of it. And I was wholeagain. The stitches were published. The reviewers made obscene noises.It is now out of print. But those stitches, those poems . , ,5The House of Hunger brought early fame to Dambudzo Marechera. It madehim the mouthpiece of that lost generation* of young Zimbabweans who foundthemselves oppressed by the colonial regime, and who were either alienated fromtheir own culture or subjected to an alien culture in exile. In the words of theZimbabwean Minister of Education at a public reading by Marechera in Hararein 1984:His work gives illuminating insights into the straggle for sanity in a situation full ofcontradictions, where there was a severe dislocation of moral and social norms which, forthe young academic, resulted in the fragmentation of family and community life and ofideals and vision, or, to quote T. S. Eliot in The Waste Land, 'A heap of broken images'.6Marechera's second book, Black Sunlight, published in 1980, attracted far lessattention. Considered by many to be unreadable and overdrawn, it was initiallybanned in Zimbabwe, where, even though the country has been independentsince 1980, the old censorship laws are still in force. The main reasons: obscenityand blasphemy. At the intervention of Zimbabwean writer colleagues, the banwas lifted shortly before Marechera's return from exile.7The novel is about a photographer (the first-person narrator), a sympathizerwith a group of young urban guerrillas. While on a photo-safari into the Africanbush, he is captured by a primitive and violent chief and hung upside down by hisheels in a chicken-run. He is rescued by a White anthropologist who is carryingout research in the area. She tells him that the guerrilla organization 'BlackSunlight' has been smashed following a military coup. The rest of the book ismade up of interweaving memories of his meetings with the group and with itsindividual members. Particular significance is given to his stay at 'Devil's End',5 ibid., 39.6 Zimbabwe, Department of Information, Press Statement 94/84/SN, 'Minister praisesZimbabwean author' (Harare, Min. of Information, 1984). Speech by Minister of Education, Dr D.Mutumbuka, at a reading by Marechera at the Courtauld Hall, Harare, 23 Feb. 1984.7 General Notice 260 of 1982, Government Gazette (12 Mar. 1982).FLORA VEiT-WILD117the group's camp in remote underground rock-catacombs, in which thephotographer sees the most incomprehensible and fantastic things and figures,at times as if he were on a descent into hell; he meets his own doppelgdnger,whom he interviews on questions of violence and art, and finally collapses todrown in a world of surrealistic dreams and visions.In Black Sunlight Marechera fuses the diverse forms of self-expression andlife-style of London's 'alternative' scene: when he wrote the book, in 1979, he wasliving in a huge commune of artists, drug addicts, meditators and individualists ofall kinds. In a process of philosophical and poetic self-discovery, the bookexplores the relationship between Marechera's concept of the total freedom of thespirit as it can be manifested in art, and the political action which aims at gainingthis freedom Š anarchism. Marechera discusses in many different ways questionsof reality, of man's capacity to perceive reality, of illusion and delusion, and of thetask of the artist in relation to all these. His doppelgdnger says to thephotographer:Day to day reality is therefore itself any illusion created by the mass of our needs, ourideas, our wants. Transform the needs, the ideas, the wants, and at once, as though with amagic wand, you transform the available reality. To write as though only one kind ofreality subsists in the world is to act out a mentally retarded mime, for a mentally deficientaudience. If I am an illusion, then that is a delusion that is very real indeed.8At the same time, Black Sunlight is a poeticized confrontation with thetheories of the futurists (particularly Marinetti) and the surrealists, whom it quotesand itself tries to emulate in their attempts at ecriture automatique. Like them,Marechera seeks the liberation of language from the fetters of syntax, a free'stream of consciousness' similar to that of James Joyce. In Black Sunlight,different planes of consciousness, recognizable stories and dreamlike visions,memories and reflections continually blend, flowing into images which are nolonger recognizable to the intellect, but which the reader must feel and imagine.This novel also presents Marechera's dichotomous view of women. On theone hand, the various female characters Š from the anthropologist rescuer to theindividual women terrorists Š are depicted as being very positive, self-assured,independent, having a positive attitude to life, and are strong, stronger even thanthe men; and blind Marie, the photographer's wife, as the symbol of sensibility, iswild and unspoiled, rooted in her own 'black sunlight'. On the other hand,Woman herself, allegorically symbolized as the 'Great Cunt' or the 'GreatWhore', emerging again and again in a wide variety of incarnations, is shownas the all-threatening, all-devouring, all-crashing chasm.Marechera sees his experimental novel Black Sunlight as a subversive work.8 D. Marechera, Black Sunlight (London, Heinemann, 1980), 68.118WORDS AS BULLETSFor him, the bombings carried out by the urban guerrillas, the breaking oflinguistic and literary norms through the power of imagination, the smashing ofsocial taboos through the explicit and aggressive presentation of sexuality, are allfacets of one and the same thing: an attempt to weaken and destroy the pressuresand demands of society. He aims to reduce reality to 'its essentials, to its atoms, tomake it actually more forceful. Reduce everything to its ultimate, last componentsand it will blow people's minds.'9 Black Sunlight is a manifesto of intellectualanarchism.For exactly this reason, he gave the title Mindblast to his third published book.He wanted it to 'blow the minds' of the people of Zimbabwe to whom he returnedin 1982 Š but he doubts whether it has had this effect. The reason for his returnwas the shooting of a film of The House of Hunger, which director Chris Austinhad begun in London. A few days after his arrival, Marechera quarrelled with thedirector and the film was completed without the author. Marechera stayed inHarare, slept in doorways, and typed Mindblast on a park bench.Mindblast is a miscellany of three plays, a prose narrative, a collection ofpoems, and a park-bench diary. In a more accessible style than his first two books,Marechera describes with wit, intelligence and vivid imagery his view of thenewly-independent state of Zimbabwe: the materialism, the political intolerance,the stupidity and corruption, the socialist slogans, how a few become rich whilethe masses become poorer. At the same time, the author's own existence as anartist preys on his mind, full of hate, self-pitying or ironic; he is out of place, madeto feel an outsider, misunderstood, despised, taken for a madman.'Why does every revolution result in the alienation of its artists?', ponders thepoet, Buddy, in the central story, 'Grimknife Jr's Story', on the death of poetry.10It describes how various artists from the generation of those who were greatlyinfluenced by the turbulent years of the revolt of the intellectuals in Europe,-now,back in Africa, are neither understood nor accepted. However, Marechera doesnot limit himself to a one-sided indictment of post-colonial society, but, in thetragicomic death of the poet who collapses in the toilet of a bar in a pool of bloodand alcohol, questions his own existence as an artist. The outward collapse ispreceded by an inner breakdown: the sudden realization that his poems areinsipid, shallow and futile.Like a sudden downpour, hurling down fists of rain on his bare head, he hadrecognised his own failure. The plangency of his defeat reverberated throughout the room,returning to him in cartoon strip figures that were dancing on the bars of the Eroica whichwas now playing to the invisible but vigorous conducting of Tony who was watching himironically from Grace's side. The harsh rain burst the drains of the house of his poems.119 Interview with Marechera, Feb. 1986.i° D. Marechera. Mindblast, or the Definitive Buddy (Harare, College Press, 1984), 58.11 Ibid., 71-2.FLORA VEIT-WILD119For Zimbabwe, with its lack of public criticism, Mindblast represents animportant contribution. However, overall, the book suffers from a viewpointwhich is too abstruse for the ordinary reader to identify with: the egocentricexistence of the poet acted out in the bar and saloon. The most powerful literarystatement is to be found in the poems. Unfortunately, Marechera's poems Šapartfrom those in MindblastŠhave never been published in a single collection, onlysporadically in anthologies and journals.12 Strongly influenced by T. S. Eliot, theyillustrate in a concentrated form the extraordinary creative power of Marechera'swriting. With a highly unusual choice of words and their contextual associations,through the juxtaposition of opposites to the point of paradox, through thecombination of the contradictory, he creates unexpected, inspired, shockingimages of great intensity. 'A terrible beauty is born out of the urgency of hisvision', writes the English critic Angela Carter in her review of The House ofHunger PEnglish and German critics consider Marechera to be one of Black Africa'sbest prose writers, and The House of Hunger is acknowledged to rank with othergreat world literature. His work is viewed in relation to that of Kafka, Joyce,Camus, Sartre, Ionesco; he himself would add Chekhov, Alfred Jarry, AntoninArtaud, the Beatnik poets (Allen Ginsberg), and, in Africa, Wole Soyinka andAyi Kwei Armah:I am in the tradition of those novelists and poets who, starting with political and socialprotest, developed to explore the division of sensibility from the environment. What Sartrecalled 'alienation', or Camus 'the absurd'; writers for whom social or national change isperfected within their own neurosis.14African criticism is divided in its judgement of Dambudzo Marechera. It istrue that his unique literary talent and his important contribution to the treatmentof the Rhodesian past are acknowledged; however, several critics describe hiswriting as bourgeois, decadent, Europeanized, and see him as alienated fromAfrican tradition, considering his negative, nihilistic visions of the situation in ayoung African state embarking on independence to be inappropriate.15 Others,12 A selection of Marechera's previously unpublished poems is contained in F. [Veit-JWfld,Patterns of Poetry in Zimbabwe (Gweru, Mambo Press, 1988).13 A. Carter, 'A witness, a prophet', The Guardian, 21 June 1979.14 Conversation with Marechera, Mar. 1986.15 For example, M. V. Mzamane, 'New writing from Zimbabwe: Dambudzo Marechera's TheHouse of Hunger', African Literature Today [Recent Trends in the Novel] (19831 XIII, 201-25J. Okonkwo, 'Dambudzo Marechera, The House of Hungef, Okike (1981), XVTO, 87-91;M. Zimunya, 'Dambudzo Marechera, The House of Hungef, in his Those Years of Drought andHunger The Birth of African Fiction in English in Zimbabwe (Gweru, Mambo Press, 1982),97-126.120WORDS AS BULLETSassessing the social reality of post-colonial Africa more realistically and critically,recognize the important (and, indeed, political) function of a writer such asMarechera,16 who takes nothing for granted, but sees it as his task to disturb, todisrupt, and to destroy.FLORA VEIT-WILD16 For example, L. Nkosi in a contribution at the International Writers' Workshop in Harare,July-August 1985; and B. Okri in 'Arts and Africa', 8 Aug. 1986, BBC African Service, transcript659 G.Zambezia (1987), XIV fii).DAMBUDZG MARECHERA:A PRELIMINARY ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY*I. PRIMARY SOURCESORIGINALSThe House of Hunger (London, Heinemann, 1978; Harare, Zimbabwe PublishingHouse, 1982).Black Sunlight (London, Heinemann, 1980).Mindhlast; or, The Definitive Buddy (Harare, College Press, 1984).These have been reviewed in the preceding essay. Apart from his three major publicationsMarechera wrote several smaller pieces, a number of which will have appeared in variousnewspapers and magazines in various countries and still have to be retrieved (for example, heworked for some time as a free-lance reviewer for West Africa in London). One of them is thefollowing short story in which he depicts some aspects of his lonely life in London.'The Sound of Snapping Wires', West Africa, 7 Mar. 1983, 603. Reprinted in F.Veit-Wild and E. Schade (eds.), Dambudzo Marechera: 4 June 1952 - 18August 1987: Pictures, Poems, Prose, Tributes (Harare, Baobab Books, 1988),27.The following three pieces were written in 1982-3, after Marechera's return to Zimbabwe.The Stimulus of Scholarship: A Drama by Buddy. Serialized in Focus [a students'magazine at the University of Zimbabwe] (1983), Nos. 1-3 and (1984) No. 1.'The Alternative Graduate' [prose-poem] hectographed and distributed at theUniversity of Zimbabwe by the author in 1982.'The Lonely and Lovely Tumult' [short story], The Sunday Mail Colour Magazine,29 May 1983, 6.I have only managed to dig out The Stimulus of Scholarship recently, after Marechera's death.This little play, which he wrote and published when he liaised with some of the members of theeditorial team of Focus (e.g. novelist and playwright H. G. Musengezi), is interesting because itis set at the University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland in the late 1950s-early 1960s. Mostobviously, Marechera had read Michael Gelfand's A Non-racial Island ojLearning: A Historyof the University College of Rhodesia from Its Inception to 1966 (Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1978)because the play recalls in detail events described in that book: such as Terence Ranger (aliasHudson), warden of Manfred Hodson Hall, being thrown into the water by outraged WhiteRhodesian citizens at one of his anti-colour bar actions at a public swimming pool; or Sarah(Sarah Kachingwe, nee Chavunduka), the first and at that time only Black girl at the College,being shuffled around from one hall of residence to the other because they were raciallysegregated and no provision had been made to accommodate Black women.* I am most indebted to Roger Stringer, University of Zimbabwe Publications Officer, and tothe Department of English, University of Zimbabwe, for their assistance in the compilation of thisbibliography.121122DAMBUDZO MARECHERA: A BIBLIOGRAPHYAs Marechera told me, he wrote and published (himself) 'The Alternative Graduate'around the same time, though I have, so far, not been able to get hold of a copy of it. He reacfrom it at a poetry reading at the University's Beit Hall (as Andrew Whaley reports in Th,Herald, 4 Apr. 1982), together with Solomon Mutswairo, Samuel Chimsoro and JoseplKumbirai.The short story 'The Lonely and Lovely Tumult' captures, in the sensations of a fewminutes, the manifold impressions of colour, movement, mood and atmosphere of Harare'sFirst Street mall.Apart from the collection of poems contained in Mindblast, poems by Marechera have beenpublished in the following anthologies:McLoughlin, T. O. (comp.), New Writing in Rhodesia (Gwelo, iVtambo Press,1976), 20-1.Muchemwa K. Z. (comp.), Zimbabwean Poetry in English: An Anthology(Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1978), 20, 107-9.Style, C. and O-lan (eds.), Mambo Book of Zimbabwean Verse in English(Gweru, Mambo Press, 1986), 293-5.[Veil-]Wild, F., Patterns of Poetry in Zimbabwe (Gweru, Mambo Press, 1988)136-45.McLougmm's and Muchemwa's anthologies contain some of Marechera's early poetry (whenhe was still writing as Charles Marechera) which he wrote while he was a student at theUniversity of Rhodesia in 1972-3, some of which were originally published in the literarymagazine Two Tone (June 1973). It is very unfortunate that the editors of the extensive MamboBook of Zimbabwean Verse merely reprinted, thirteen years later, three of these same poemsinstead of asking Marechera for some previously unpublished poems. Patterns of Poetrycontains fifteen of his recent poems (mostly love poems), and reprints four from MindblastVeit-Wild, F. and Schade, E. (eds.). Dumbudzo Marechera: 4 June 1952 - 18August 1987: Pictures, Poems, Prose, Tributes (Harare, Baobab Books,1988).This collection is a tribute to Marechera's life and work, and contains a number of his poems,prose texts and essays, as well as obituaries, critiques and photographs.TRANSLATIONS1. GermanHaus des Hungers (Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp, 1981).Schwarzes Sonnenlicht [extracts from Black Sunlight], in O. Filip, and E. Larsen(eds.), Die zerbrochene Feder: Schriftsteller im Exil (Stuttgart, Thienemann,1984), 271-8.A contract for the translation of Mindblast is being negotiated between College Press, Harare,and a German publisher.2. DutchTranslation of The House of Hunger with Unieboek bv, forthcoming.FLORA VEST-WILD1233. FrenchExtract from Black Sunlight in D. Coussy, J. Bardolph, J-P. Durix et J. Sevry (eds.),Anthologie critique de la litterMure africaineanglophone (Paris, Union generated'Editions, 1983), 468-72.The German translation of The House ofHungerby Claus Peter Dressier and Curt Kaemmererdeserves high praise. While staying very close and truthful to the original, the translatorsmanage to re-create Marechera's breath-taking drive and vigour in the German idiom, at thesame time producing an excellent literary work impressive in its own right.The inclusion of extracts of Black Sunlight in the collection of writings by exiled authors,Die zerbrochene Feder [The Broken Nib], appears to be very inappropriate and regrettable. Thebook contains pieces by exiled writers from authoritarian or fascist regimes in Eastern Europe(the majority), Asia, Latin America and Africa, mainly South Africa (!). The introduction toMarechera accordingly gives a wrong impression, assuming that he was exiled fromindependent Zimbabwe to study in Oxford.II. SECONDARY SOURCES1. On his life, work and views generallyThe following titles all contain profiles of the personality, life and work of Marechera, oftenbased on interviews with him.'Arts and Africa', no. 288P, BBC African Service transcript (London), 8 July 1979.Simpson, H., 'Profile: Dambudzo Marechera', Art Links: The Commonwealth ArtsReview, 2, Apr.-June 1980, 31-8, 'Out of Battle: The Arts of Zimbabwe', 32-3.Imfeld, A., 'Portraits of African writers', no. 9, Deutsche Welle transcript [Cologne],1979; subsequently published in African Writers on the Air (Cologne, DeutscheWelle, 1984), 92-101; reprinted in Moto, XVIII, vi, 7 Feb. 1981, 9.Imfeld, A., 'Dambudzo MarecheraŠKafka in den Ruinen Zimbabwes' [Kafka in theruins of Zimbabwe], in his Vision und Waffe, Afrikanische Autoren, Themen,Traditionen (Zurich, Unionsverlag, 1981), 337-48.'Exiled writer looks back in anger', The Sunday Mail, 14 Feb. 1982.Gambanga, J., 'Writing with a cockroach-eye-view of life', Gemini News Service[London], GB 3303, 1983.'Dambudzo Marechera', in H. M. Zell, C. Bundy, V. Coulon (eds.), ^4 New Reader'sGuide to African Literature (London, Heinemann, 1983), 414-15.Imfeld, A., 'The facts are ugly: Zur Literatur von Tansi und Marechera. Im Haus desHungersŠWarten auf die Polizei', Die Wochenzeitung [Zurich], 14 Dec. 1984.'Escape from the House of Hunger' [interview with Marechera by George Alagiah],South, Dec. 1984, 10-11.Hove, C, 'The Artist/Writer's Lonely Vision: A Comparative Study of the Portrayalof the Artist's Social Role in Armah's Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born,Fragments and Why Are We So Blest? and Marechera's House of Hunger andMindblasf (Harare, University of Zimbabwe, Dept. of English, unpubl.BA(Hons) dissertation, 1985). Marechera discussed on pp. 53-83.Veit-Wild, F., 'Write or go mad' [A Portrait of Marechera], Africa Events, Mar. 1986,124DAMBUDZO MAftECHERA: A BIBLIOGRAPHY58-9. Shortened versions of the same article published in New African, Apr.1986, 52, and The Guardian [Lagos], 9 Feb. 1986; and in German inTageszeitung, 4 Dec. 1987, 16.Lloyd, F., Interview with Marechera, 1986 [wide-ranging taped interview], EnglishDept., University of Zimbabwe, transcript forthcoming.Lansu, A., 'Ik wil kortsluiting veroozaken in de geest van de lezer' [I want to cause ashort-circuit in the mind of the reader], Vrij Nederiand, 21 Feb. 1987.Bossema, W., 'Twee Schrijvers in Zimbabwe: Een keurige huisvader en een dronkengetto-jongen' [Two writers in Zimbabwe: A decent family man and a drunkenghetto kid], Onze Wereld Magazine, Nov. 1987. On Marechera and Mungoshi.Veit-Wild, F., 'Dambudzo Marechera', in Kritisches Lexikon zur fremdsprachigenGegenwartsliteratur (Munich, Edition Text + Kritik, 1987) XIII. Originalversion of preceding essay.Petersen, K. H. An Articulate Anger: Dambudzo Marechera: i9J2-#7(Mundelstrup[Denmark], Dangaroo Press, 1988). Interview with Marechera recorded in May1987.Interesting in Imfeld's 'Kafka in den Ruinen Zimbabwes' is how he depicts Marechera'sappearance at the Horizonte-Festival in West Berlin in 1979 where the explosive language ofthis young and at that time little-known writer left the audience compeietely stunned.Generally, however, Imfeld tends to overdraw his features in quite a bombastic andsensationalist style, and his comparison between Kafka and Marechera is rather questionable.In African literature Imfeld compares Marechera with the Congolese writer Sony Labou Tansistating that the two belong to a new generation in African writing.Highly recommended is George Alagiah's interview in South for the detailed insights itgives into Marechera's background and his views on the present state of Zimbabweanliterature.Chenjerai Hove's dissertation, though dealing with specific works of Marechera, is listedhere because it focuses very strongly on the general views and attitude of the writer, his 'lonelyvision' seen vis a vis social commitment; it does not provide a very detailed analysis of TheHouse of Hunger and Mindblast.The following three titles should be seen in relation to the last phase of Marechera's life, after hisreturn to Zimbabwe in 1982.'Minister praises Zimbabwean author', Press Statement 94/84/SN (Harare, Dept. ofInformation), 23 Feb. 1984. Speech by the Minister of Education,Dr D. Mutumbuka, at a reading by Marechera in the Courtauld Hall, Harare.Caute, D. 'Marechera and the colonelŠA Zimbabwean writer and the claims of thestate', in his The Espionage of the Saints: Two Essays on Silence and the State(Lpndon, H. Hamilton, 1986), 1-96.Kreimeier, K. Geborstene Trommeln. Afrikas zweite Zerstorung. Literarisch-politische Expeditionen (Frankfurt, Verlag Neue Kritik, 1985); 204-8 onMarechera.It is surprising to hear a senior government representative such as the Minister of .Education,giving so much recognition and praise to Marechera as 'one of Zimbabwe's foremost writers'(see also preceding essay, p. 116), considering how little acknowledgement and support he hadreceived from public and literary authorities before his death. His clashes with those have beenclosely observed by Caute in his essay on 'Marechera and the colonel', which has so far been theFLORA VEIT-WILD125longest publication on Marechera. Giving humorous insights into Marechera's daily life inHarare after 1982, it focuses on the 'persecution' of the not always popular writer by thegovernment (such as his detention during the 1984 Zimbabwe International Book Fair),adopting too uncritically, however, Marechera's own persecution complex.German literary journalist Klaus Kreimeier, who visited several African countries andtalked to some of the leading writers including Marechera, points out how his writings are seenby literary authorities such as Ranga Zinyemba as too decadent and nihilistic, not appropriateto the process of nation-building.The following pieces (all based on interviews) deal with Marechera's views on somespecial issues (poetry, language, censorship).[Veit-]Wild, F., Patterns of Poetry in Zimbabwe (Gweru, Mambo Press, 1988),20-3, 131-5.A critical assessment of Marechera's poetry and an extensive interview with him about hisviews on poetry.Veit-Wild, F., ' "Ich hore zu, wie Worter meinem Bewufitsein entspringen":Anmerkungen aus Zimbabwe zu Sprache und Literatur im nachkolonialenAfrika' ['I am listening to the way in which words emerge from my mind':Annotations from Zimbabwe about language and literature in post-colonialAfrica], Osnabrucker Beitrage zur Sprachtheorie (1984), Apr., XXV, 104-12;106-109 on Marechera.Whaley, A., 'House of pain* light', The Sunday Mail, 8 Mar. 1982.In the last two titles Marechera talks about subjugating the (ex-colonial) English language inorder to make it serve his own means. Whaley also draws a subtle portrait of the writer of TheHouse of Hunger after his return home.'CensorshipŠDoes it clean the mind?', Moto, XXIII, May 1984, 5-6.'Dambudzo Marechera: From the Journal', Index on Censorship, XIII, vi, Dec. 1984,27-9.The last two titles, respectively, display Marechera's strong rejection of any kind of censorshipand tell of his detention during the 1984 Zimbabwe International Book Fair in Harare.2. On The House of Hunger'A talent worth watching out for', Publishing News (1979), 1,19. On Marechera at theGuardian Fiction Prize ceremony.Carter, A., 'A witness, a prophet', The Guardian, 21 June 1979.Fleming, R., 'A Zimbabwean's fictional Olympics', Encore American and World-wide News, 3 Dec. 1979, 34.Herbert, H., 'Double visions of the imaginative landscape', The Guardian, 30 Nov.1979,11.Lessing, D., 'A cultural tug-of-war', Books and Bookmen (1979), XXIV, ix, 62-3.Style, O-lan, 'Introduction' to 'Annual Bibliography of African Literature for 1978',section on 'Southern Africa', Journal of Commonwealth Literature (1979),XXIV, ii, 15.The preceding titles are mainly reviews of The House of Hunger and reactions in the Britishpress to the awarding of the Guardian Fiction Prize to Marechera in 1979. The critics express126DAMBUDZO MARECHERA: A BIBLIOGRAPHYtheir surprise about this 'miracle' of a new talent who so passionately and urgently impresses hispain and anger on to the reader. At the same time, they point to his sometimes harsh, alwaysunpredictable character: 'a talent worth watching out for' has also to be taken literallyconsidering Marechera's hurling crockery past the chandeliers at the prize-giving ceremony andother 'performances'.'Im Haus des Hungers', Hamburger Abendblatt, 3 Mar. 1982.'Haus des Hungers5, Zitty [Berlin], Apr. 1982, 16-29.Schneider, U., 'Dambudzo Marechera, Haus des Hungers', Hessicher Rundfunktranscript [Frankfurt], 9 Sept. 1982.Becker, J., *Aus dem Munde eines Schriftstellers: Erzahlungen des AfrikanersDambudzo Marechera5 [Out of the mouth of a writer: Stories of the AfricanDambudzo Marechera], Frankfurter Rundschau, 12 Dec. 1982.Holzer, K. 'Nicht nur furs Regal' [Not only for the bookshelf], ORF (OsterreichischerRundfunk) transcript [Vienna], 9 Feb. 1983.The German reviewers of the House of Hunger also highly acclaim the book including thebrilliant German translation. They see Marechera as one of the best Black African writers,emphasizing the general modern, cosmopolitan quality of his literature as opposed to typicalAfrican writing.Okonkwo, J., 'Dambudzo Marechera, The House of Hunger', Okike (1981), XVIII,87-91.Zimunya, M., 'Dambudzo Marechera, The House of Hunger", in his Those Years ofDrought and Hunger: The Birth of African Fiction in English in Zimbabwe(Gwera, Mambo Press, 1982), 97-126.Mzamane, M. V., 'New writing from Zimbabwe: Dambudzo Marechera's The Houseof Hunger9, African Literature Today (1983), XIII: Recent Trends in the Novel,201-25.Zinyemba, R., 'Zimbabwe's "lost" novelists in search of direction', Moto (1983), XV,7, 9-10.These African critics, while recognizing Marechera's unique talent and his importantcontribution to African literature, unanimously disapprove of his nihilist and chaotic viewswhich they see to be closely related to European decadence and neurosis, 'alien to AfricaŠacontinent of hope and realizable dreams' (Okonkwo).Cohen, D., 'Zimbabwean literature', Canadian Journal of African Studies (1981), V,xv, 2, 337-9.McLoughlin, T. O., 'The past and present in African literature: Examples fromcontemporary Zimbabwean fiction', Presence Africaine (1984), CXXXII,93-107.McLoughlin, T. O., 'Black writing in Zimbabwe', in G. D. Killam (ed.), The Writingof East and Central Africa (London, Heinemann, 1984), 100-19. House ofHunger and Black Sunlight discussed on pp. 110-12.McLoughlin, T. O., 'Cultural authenticity in Black Zimbabwean literature in English:A case for metonymy', in D. Rochay and P. Dakeyo (eds.), Nouvelles du sudtLitterature et anthropologie (Paris, Silex, 1986), 79-91. House of Hungerdiscussed on pp. 84-6.FLORA VEIT-WILD127These last essays place Marechera's work, particularly The House of Hunger, into the contextof recent Zimbabwean writing. They put emphasis on Marechera's very new and powerfulnarrative style, the 'immediacy of his image' which makes the 'misery and madness, pain andwant... present in every line simultaneously' (Cohen). Thus they see him break away 'frommost trends in Zimbabwean fiction by accenting the intensity of the inner world of his narrators, . . hence the centrality of the interior monologue and the inclination to write a narrativefragmented by diffuse memories of the past' (McLoughlin).3. On Black SunlightLadsun, J., 'Sunlight and Chaos', New Statesman, 12 Dec. 1980, 45-6.Bryce, J., 'Through a lens darkly', Times Literary Supplement, 2 Jan. 1981, 19.'Literary milestone goes the distance!', The Herald, 2 Feb. 1981.Maveneka, L., 'A glimpse of Hell', Moto (1982), I, v, 41.Walling, W., 'Black Sunlight', World Literature Today (1982), LVi 169.In the assessment of Black Sunlight, the reviewers are much less definite than in the case ofThe House of Hunger. While the reviewer in the Zimbabwe Herald praises it as a 'literarymilestone', Jane Bryce calls it a 'daring attempt', Walling finds that Marechera's first novel'has not proved entirely successful', Maveneka perceives it as the 'hallucinations of aschizophrenic', and James Ladsun ends up calling it 'an heroic failure'.'Judgment on banned novel plea reserved', The Herald, Feb. 8. 1982.Mamziva. D., 'Novelist lining up forces to fight book ban', The Herald, 12 Feb.1982.These are about the banning of Black Sunlight by the Zimbabwe Censorship Board,Marechera's reaction to it and M. Zimuoya's appeal against the ban which he perceives as'a symbolic emasculation of Zimbabwean literature'.Veit-Wild, F., Interview with Marechera on Black Sunlight, Feb. 1986(unpublished).In this interview Marechera talks about the literary and philosophical concepts behind thebook.Tsomondo, T., 'Marechera's Black Sunlight. Paper presented at the colloquiumon Zimbabwean literature, University of Zimbabwe, 23 Apr. 1987.The paper analyses particularly the stylistic devices used in Black Sunlight.4. On MindblastZinyemba, R., 'An eloquent but a tortured blast', Herald, 17 Sept. 1984.'Dambudzo Marechera: From the Journal', Index on Censorship, XIII, vi,Dec. 1984, 27-9. [Already listed above under section II, 1].Zinyemba, R., Zimbabwean Drama: A Study of Shona and English Plays(Gweru, Mambo Press, 1984), 95-109 on the plays of\ Mindblast.'Arts and Africa', no. 659G, BBC African Service transcript [London], 8 Aug.1986,3-5.Review of Mindblast, in the Times of Swaziland, c.Oct. 1986 (exact date couldnot be confirmed).128DAMBUDZO MARECHERA: A BIBLIOGRAPHYUnfortunately Mindblast has not had much publicity and, as it has been only locallypublished, especially not outside Zimbabwe. Interviewed for the BBC, Marechera talksabout his experiences after his home-coming to Zimbabwe in 1982 which form thebackground of the book.The Index on Censorship describes how Marechera was detained just when the bookcame out, pointing out the 'lack of concern shown by his publishers and the Book Fairorganizers'; it then reproduces a lengthy passage from the 'Journal' in Mindblast.Zimbabwean critic Ranga Zinyemba acknowledges Marechera's utmost honesty inexposing his personal struggle in a 'world that in many ways is too narrow to containmanifestations of his individualism', while at the same time criticizing the too egocentricvision of this book. However, the reviewer in the Times of Swaziland sees Marechera(with Mindblast) 'at the forefront of a new literary revolution in Africa ... by new youngwriters that are marginally better than Ngugi and Achebe ever were'.5. Film'Drama in the House of Hunger', Moto, I, iii. July 1982, 37, 39.Nkosi, L., 'House of Hunger lifts the veil on shocking truths', The Herald, 9 Sept.1983.Reviews of Chris Austin's film House of Hunger which is based on Marechera's book andincludes documentaries about his life in London and arrival home in Zimbabwe.6. ObituariesThe Times, 20 Aug. 1987.Zimunya, M., 'Dambudzo Marechera: Portrait of an extraordinary artist', SundayMail, 23 Aug. 1987, Cl? CIO.Fraser, R., 'Dambudzo Marechera', The Independent, 25 Aug. 1987.Ripken, P., Tribute to Dambudzo Marechera, Deutsche Welle [Cologne], 23Aug. 1987.Lloyd, F., Tribute to Dambudzo Marechera, Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corpor-ation, Radio 1 [Harare], 26 Aug. 1987.'Arts and Africa', no. 714G, BBC African Service transcript [London], 28 Aug.1987, 4-6.Omotoso, K., '(A writer's diary) When the young die: The example ofDambudzo Marechera', West Africa, 14 Sept. 1987.Abu, S., 'Dambudzo Marechera (1955-1987): An obituary of Zimbabwe'swell-known writer', Africa Events, Sept. 1987, 76-7.'Marechera Š flash of lightning', Moto (1987), LVIII, 22.'How will the future see Dambudzo Marechera?', Prize Africa, Oct. 1987, 6-7.Mawerera, R., 'In memory of Dambudzo Marechera: Zimbabwe loses a fearlessgenius', Parade, Oct. 1987, 6-7.Tower, A., 'Dambudzo Marechera', Listen [Hamburg] (1987), III, ix, 47.FLORA VEIT-WILD129Compared to the often reluctant reception and little support Marechera received,especially in his last years, the enthusiastic recognition he has obtained after his death isremarkable. However, many of the obituaries deal rather with his controversialpersonality and erratic life-style than with his work. This indicates a certain insecurity as tohow ultimately to understand and assess Marechera's writings. Comprehensive studies ofhis work are still a task of the future and will have to include his posthumous manuscripts.HarareFLORA VEIT-WILDNoteWhen Marechera died, he left behind four (mostly short) novels, one miscellanyof prose, poetry and drama, three dramas, one choreodrama, two prosefragments, two short stories, a collection of five essays, about 125 poems and onepoetic sequence. It is not known how many more manuscripts he left at thevarious places he stayed at, or with publishers, and these still have to be retrieved.In order to enable a complete posthumous publication of Marechera'sunpublished works, and to foster future research on his life and writings, theexecutors of Marechera's estate would be most indebted if any reader could passon to them:Ł unpublished manuscripts, poems and other writings by Marechera;Ł references to published work by or about Marechera not included in thisbibliography;Ł any documents, correspondence, etc., relating to his life or work;Ł any reviews, studies or critiques not included in the bibliography.Communications should be addressed to:The Dambudzo Marechera TrustP. O. Box A595Avondale, HarareZimbabwe.