Chronicle Editor
Gilbert Munetsi, Correspondent
The domestic literary sector has described the demise of Dr Charles Muzuva Mungoshi as the fall of an institution as they regarded him as “writers within a writer.”
With 18 distinct published works to his name, the decorated novelist, poet, playwright, short story writer, actor, mentor and translator succumbed to neurological complications at Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals on Saturday, February 16, having battled ill-health for a decade.
He is survived by wife Jesesi, four sons (Farai, Graham, Nyasha and Charles), daughter Tsitsi and seven grandchildren.
Several established writers constituting the umbrella Zimbabwe Writers Association thronged the late Dr Mungoshi’s Zengeza 1 home to pay their last homage to a personality that some described as both a pioneer and beacon of Zimbabwean literature.
Among them were Musaemura Zimunya, Shimmer Chinodya, Memory Chirere, Ignatius Mabasa, Chirikure Chirikure, Dr Ruth Tsopotsa, Shumirai Nhanhanga and ZWA chairperson, Monica Cheru-Mpambawashe, among others. Also in their company was the former director of the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe, Elvas Mari, who is also a member of the Charles Mungoshi Foundation.
Mari decried the coming to naught of efforts by NACZ to establish a Hall of Fame to preserve works by contemporary artistes, noting this would have been the genesis of any other recognitions such as the National Arts and Merits Awards (NAMA). Through the foundation, he said, they would, however, strive to keep the late legendary writer’s legacy alive.
“At face value, Charles did not exhibit the genius that lay underneath. Of course, he was an interesting character who was quick to make friends, humble, thoughtful and managed to combine humour with a sense of seriousness as reflected in the numerous themes he touched on – life, death, pain and the struggle of the sexes,” said (Shimmer) Chinodya in his summation of his comrade-in-art.
The Harvest of Thorns writer said he first got to know Mungoshi back in 1978 when he was an intern at the Literature Bureau while studying his (Hons) English Literature degree at the then University of Rhodesia.
“I had just finished my first novel, Dew in the Morning, and I was anxious to have him look at it. As a new writer, you could say that I was presumptuous, assuming it was a right to approach senior people in the trade and that it was also their obligation to serve me.
“I, however, regret having turned down his first day invitation to a drink with his royalties from Heinemann African Writers (as I was a devout Christian then) because his wish then was for us to share ideas in an informal environment as opposed to my thinking we had to have the copy before us to review it,” Chinodya reminisced.
University of Zimbabwe lecturer and writer Memory Chirere believes each and every one of the late Mungoshi’s works individually stand out clearly.
“For instance, Waiting for the Rain won an international award because it asks the fundamental questions such as when you are educated, does it make you understand where you are, or it shifts your focus? On the other hand, Coming of the Dry Season toys with the idea of what it means to be in a country that is a colony.
“Mungoshi even went into folk-tales, a demonstration that he had the capacity to pick what is local and make it international. In that regard he became an ambassador explaining what it entails to be a Zimbabwean in the past, present and the future. He is a unique cut off the same block as other contemporary authors like Professor Solomon Mutswairo, Chenjerai Hove, Mordecai Hamutyinei and Nobert Mutasa, among others,” reckoned Chirere.
For Musaemura Zimunya, Mungoshi was “a living luminary of Zimbabwean literature, just like Chinua Achebe in Nigeria and Ngugi waThiongo in Kenya.”
Before he became friends with Mungoshi and the late Charles Dambudzo Merechera, he (Zimunya) had used the former’s works for his thesis in England, the focus being an example of the birth of Zimbabwean literature.
“Having been the first to be published overseas, the quality of Charles Mungoshi’s works exceeded local expectations. People from the world over came to know about an author from a Shona tradition and cultural values shone in his works, making it no wonder that his works began to receive international attention from scholars and academics alike.
“No institution that teaches literature in this country has not used any of his books. Since 1975, generations have read and studied him and for that they have been appreciative,” he said.
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