Tsitsi Dangarembga, Booker Prize Nominated Author, Faces Trial | Books | DW

Three days after Tsitsi Dangarembga was nominated for the Booker Prize long list on July 28 with her latest novel, This pitiful body, She was arrested. Now, she has made it to the list of the UK’s top literary awards, also three days before her trial begins after her arrest.

In July, the internationally acclaimed author and filmmaker was simply standing at an intersection with a friend, holding a sign that read, “We want better. Reform our institutions.” Shortly after, a riot truck arrived; the police arrested them and held them overnight.

Very few people had dared to join the anti-government protests called by the opposition to coincide with the second anniversary of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s electoral victory on July 31. Before the day, the president had described the demonstrations as “an insurrection to democratically overthrow an elected government” and declared them illegal, sending police forces to suppress all protest attempts.

Therefore, most people preferred to stay home and express their opposition through social media, using the hashtag #ZANUPFmustgo, which refers to the Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF). The political organization has been in power since the country’s independence in 1980. For a long time under Robert Mugabe, its vice president Mnangagwa assumed power after the dictator’s removal from office in 2017.

Fighting for basic citizen rights

Despite threats from Mnangagwa, the author was one of those who took to the streets of Harare that day. “I was one of the few citizens who felt that our right [to demonstrate and petition the government peacefully] They took it from us, “he told DW,” and so we move on. ”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4lQxJ7kNQQ

He explained that critics are protesting against “the poor governance in Zimbabwe, the repression of the authorities against dissent and, of course, corruption, the lack of provision of services, a large amount of alleged misappropriation of funds that were intended for the COVID response “.

Now, after her arrest, she is “accused of attending a meeting with the intention of inciting public violence, disruption of public order and acts of intolerance,” the author said. Those charges could land her in jail. “I have to be prepared for everything. I hope and pray for the best,” she added.

Author of one of the ‘100 stories that shaped the world’

Posted in 2018, This pitiful body was praised for New York Times Book Review like a “masterpiece”, while Kirkus Reviews He described it as a “haunting, incisive and timely glimpse into how misogyny and class struggle shape life in postcolonial Zimbabwe.”

‘Nervous conditions’ has become a modern classic

The Booker-nominated novel is the third part of a trilogy that Tsitsi Dangarembga began with. Nervous conditions in 1988. The sequel, titled The book of no, came out in 2006.

Nervous conditions It firmly established Dangarembga’s reputation on the international literary scene: it was the first book written by a black Zimbabwean woman to be published in English. The author won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize with him in 1989, resulting in translations in many languages.

In 2018, the novel was included in the BBC’s list of “100 stories that shaped the world”, landing among those of Salman Rushdie. Children of midnight and Antoine de Saint-Exupery The little Prince.

A film activist

However, the acclaim of Dangarembga’s debut novel did not facilitate the materialization of his next projects.

“Nervous conditions it didn’t get any traction in Zimbabwe, “she said at the opening panel of the African Book Festival in Berlin in 2019, where she was invited to curate the event.” I’ve always been writing against power and that’s why it doesn’t always happen. “

After her debut novel, the author, who was born in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in 1959, studied film at the German Academy of Film and Television in Berlin from 1989 to 1996, and later received her doctorate in African Studies at the Humboldt University of Berlin

Dangarembga’s doctoral thesis was on the reception of African cinema

While doing so, he wrote the script for the film. Neria (1993), which became the highest grossing film in Zimbabwe. Its success was contributed by the soundtrack of the country’s most internationally recognized cultural icon, musician Oliver Mtukudzi, who passed away in January 2019.

Dangarembga also directed his own documentaries and feature films, including Son of all (1996), which was the first feature film directed by a black Zimbabwean woman.

After living in Europe, she returned to Zimbabwe with her family in 2000, where she established various projects to develop the film industry and support female directors. She founded, for example, a production company called Nyerai Films, as well as the International Women’s Picture Film Festival in Harare.

He is also a founding member of the Institute of Creative Arts for Progress in Africa, an organization that supports artwork and audiovisual productions in Zimbabwe.

A Booker-nominated novel initially rejected by publishers

‘This Mournable Body’ takes place in the late 1990s in Zimbabwe

This pitiful body He hardly saw the light of day either. “I had been rejected by different publishers and at some point I was so desperate that I started posting excerpts on Facebook,” Dangarembga revealed at the African Book Festival.

Fortunately, the novelist’s digital SOS was discovered by renowned editor and literary critic Ellah Wakatama Allfrey, who got the book published.

Booker’s long and short list nominations could not have been better timed to help her garner international support: “I am happy the arrest came after I was included in the long list for the Booker Prize, because I have been writing for more than three decades and I have not been very successful, “the author modestly told DW in August during a video interview from her home in Harare.

“That kind of recognition is very positive in terms of my self-confidence,” he added. “And it’s wonderful to have something so positive while I’m going through these other challenges.”

DW’s Sabine Kieselbach interviewed Tsitsi Dangarembga in August for the DW Books YouTube channel.