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Chenjerai Hove
Born in 1954 near Zvishavane, Chenjerai Hove published his first
collection of poetry, Up in Arms, in 1982 and The Red Hills
of Home in 1985; the latter drew on of his deeply felt moral
anguish over the brutalities of Zimbabwe's war of liberation (1967-
80), which he observed while teaching in the rural areas during the
period.
His third volume of poetry, Rainbows in the Dust (Baobab
Books, 1997) is a reflection on the betrayals of independence. His
first novel, Bones (1988), which won him the Noma
Award, shows the depth of his empathy for rural people and in
particular rural women. If Hove is (or was) a nationalist, he is also
fearless observer, and has never shied away from recording the
violence of the new Zimbabwe in his fiction, his poetry and his
journalism. An outspoken social and cultural critic, he writes a
weekly column for The Zimbabwe Standard. His other novels are
Shadows (Baobab Books, 1994), Ancestors (College Press,
1996); and he has two collections of essays, Shebeen Tales
(Serif, London, and Baobab Books 1994), Palaver Finish (Weaver
Press, 2002); the latter is also translated into Shona as Zvakwana!
and Ndebele as Akudle Inqondo.
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