Zimbabwean writer Philani Nyoni, writes an interesting and candid review of Ignatius Mabasa's book 'The Mad' with its colourful insights of Harare, Africa and... sanity.

The Mad reviewed by Philani Nyoni in teambooktu.com

https://teambooktu.com/harare-is-a-garishly-painted-whore-a-review-of-ignatius-mabasas-the-mad?

TITLE: The Mad

PUBLISHED BY: amaBooks Publishers & Carnelian Heart Publishing

ISBN: 978-1-914287-96-1

PAGES: 235

AUTHOR: Ignatius Mabasa, Translated by J. Tsitsi Mutiti

I received a copy of Ignatius Mabasa’s The Mad with the anticipation of a bottle green fly washing its hands over a pile of human shit. I like shit, good shit, Ignatius usually writes good shit and I hoped this one, J. Tsitsi Mutiti’s translation of his iconic debut, Mapenzi, would fall into that category.

Soon after getting into the text I had the feeling I should read the original book in chiShona. I suppose I wanted to see how far from the original text The Mad  had strayed. I was bothered by the translation of “Shirikadzi inochema-chema” into “The widow sobs” (36).  It felt inadequate, and so I got the original version, in chiShona, and began to read them side by side. I quickly abandoned the comparison, satisfied that language carries a whole world on its shoulders: cosmology, symbols, blood memory and all that juicy stuff. I have, for a while, been speaking to Mabasa about translation, have followed Ngugi’s spectre to Limuru and stood in the Polytechnic raised where his theatre was razed, and one thing I know for certain, is that translation is more an act of rewriting. A simple phrase like “he felt as if a heavy person was sitting on him” when read in chiShona has supernatural connotations which the English does not convey, unless one chooses to over-explain. In the same vein, there are instances where the Shona idiom shines through translation, and the translator’s care is evident when she prefaces with phrases like “the ancients knew about life when they stated…” (51). I abandoned my duel-wielding style and decided to read The Mad for what it is, not the book I had formed up in my head.

In this translation, Mabasa’s timelessness shines through. What seemed to concern the writer in the year 2000 is still contemporary; in the eyes of his characters I saw a Harare that hadn’t changed much in twenty years. Over the course of my reading, I pondered one question: WHAT IS MADNESS? According to Einstein, it is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results.

“I am not mad, but I know those who are mad” (183). We are offered many definitions of madness throughout the book, blessed with various samples and each invites one to ponder deeply. Sometimes madness is pathological, at times behavioural. It is institutional as well, it is all around us. Stylistically, it is not deployed as a tool with scat and jazzy rhythm like Brian Chikwava’s Seventh Street Alchemy, but appearances can be deceiving. Perhaps the style represents some semblance of sanity, a world that looks ordered and stable, but beneath the surface, fire burns and cauldron bubbles.

The text is acutely aware of its timelessness. On page 15 the narrator laments not being able to read his Mungoshi in an unlit minibus, on page 19 we are offered an insight into the persona’s inner turmoil when he says, “Now I appreciate Dambudzo Marechera’s sufferings as he carried around his idiosyncratic ideas, with those who didn’t think the same way as him calling him insane”. Again, the reader asks, WHAT IS MADNESS? It is interesting to ponder that line in connection with one on page 15, “No, don’t think that I am mad. When I am out of my mind I will let you know.” Or another on the following page: “Where can you find the strength to argue with someone and convince them that you aren’t crazy? It is not possible. That only makes them think your madness has stepped up a notch”.

In these passages, the author not only nods at Marechera and Mungoshi, like books that have literary characters are wont to do, there is hint of legacy and continuation, which justifies the existence of this publication as though answering the question of what has changed from the Harare Marechera sketched in Mindblast, or the place Mungoshi’s Lucifer Mandengu described as a failure’s junk heap in Waiting for the Rain.

Marechera, Mungoshi and Stanley Nyafukudza are often described in Zimbabwean literature as the Unbelievers who were disillusioned early with the liberation struggle. In Mabasa’s offering, the liberation war is a major part of the plot, and this time we see the fortunes of those who faced the bullets turned upside down, mostly through the plight of Hamundigone. “I am no longer a comrade, every other lizard is now calling itself a comrade” (36). The population is vastly disillusioned with the war, those ‘born free’ profess that, “…this war you always talk about has nothing to do with us. I don’t even know what Smith, whom you fought, looks like, so don’t keep irritating us. Were you forced to go to war?” (111). Meanwhile, some are claiming to have fought in the war and it seems to be a currency of power (183).

It is still an Animal Farm, as per a subtle nod to Orwell that references the new elite as not made in the image of God but with hooves to tread on the masses (18). The country seems to have gone to the dogs; and that is why “my brother is a real dog, like Harare” (85), an image that’s a bit on the (wet?) nose, since we have an actual dog named Harare featuring in the novel. Nutters are not welcome near Parliament, “even though the place itself is riddled with lunatics” (23). Although, I dare say, across the world, very few houses of Parliament aren’t nuthouses. Sewage flows in the streets (71), “Harare is worthless. Like bubblegum that has lost its flavour and just wastes your energy in chewing.” (38). Harare is brutal (57). Harare is a witch (35). Harare is a garishly painted whore… Harare is shameless do you know – and heartless. It is immoral like a plate that you dish out on even though it has not been washed… Harare! I fear Harare! (40). The Zimbabwe portrayed here, “has scooped out my spirit, the same way you do when digging a grave” (15). And whose fault is it? “…it’s those who have so pissed on you that even a war slogan has become nauseating” (13).

The pages are heavy with the smell of decay. Not just the piss and sewage drowning out the streets that even the blind know by smell when they have reached, but everyday life itself is in decay, “the life of youths in Harare is much like the heavily polluted Mukuvisi River” (56).  In Harare, “…the truth is that we all prostitute ourselves” (64). Although the characters are well sketched and feshed out, we see people alienated from themselves, transformed by poverty into caricatures in this Harare. They begin “to act like Americans who have no time for others” (25) and even walk headlong into destructive ways through alcohol and substance abuse, after all, “what way is not death?” (219) “Totems and clan names in Harare are the car you drive, the chequebook and MasterCard you carry, the suits you wear and the cellphone you have” (46). 

Humour carries this text a long way, reminiscent of Marechera’s House of Hunger where the horror of the details is saved by the quality of writing. The situations may be tragic but you have to laugh. It is not a damp and morose story of trial and flowing shit, that river of shit has many nuggets in it, sometimes the simple advice, like, “Bunny, do you know that if you steal you’ll be arrested? So let some things alone, like a sister’s breast” (194), because, “you may admire your sister’s breast, but no matter how arousing it may be, there’s not a thing that you as a brother can do about it” (44).

I hate that this book comes at a time when we have become obsessed with African positivity and enjoy labelling critical writers like NoViolet Bulawayo sellouts, a time when we seem to have forgotten that literature is a mirror, and breaking it doesn’t improve your veneer. I think such criticisms do not consider who we are writing for. For me, as it is with Stephen King, “writing is necessary for my sanity. As a writer, I can externalize my fears and insecurities… I’m able to ‘write myself sane'”.

It is still a good story, and for those who have seen sewage flow in the streets who have run out of candles during power cuts, or seen people lose their sanity and still go to work, with nobody stopping them even though they are crazy (34), it stands relevant today as it did back then. If only African writers could choose to write something more positive; right? Well, “…’if only’ is a madman’s philosophy” (55).

Philani Amadeus Nyoni

Philani Amadéus Nyoni is a Zimbabwean writer and actor.  His writings have been published on several platforms and media worldwide. This is his review of Ignatius Mabasa's latest work, 'The Mad'.

Book Review: The Mad by Ignatius T. Mabasa - Translated by J. Tsitsi Mutiti

The Mad reviewed by Tafadzwa Madzika in Greedy South (https://www.greedysouth.co.zw/2026/01/book-review-mad-by-ignatius-t-mabasa.html)

In Zimbabwean society, and to a broader extent Southern African society, there are larger than life characters who are regulars at the local shopping centre, who have their sanity constantly in question. They always have alcohol on hand and offer up monologues and rants against the "authorities" without any motivation. The lack of care by social services or the absence of them as a whole, makes them easy to feel sympathetic for, while their characters are often abrasive and easy to hate. 

This is Hamundigone, a war veteran and teacher at the centre of Ignatius Mabasa's The Mad, a 25 year old novel originally published in Shona as Mapenzi but recently translated Into English by J. Tsitsi Mutiti. In monologues that showcase keen insight and channel allegory, Hamundigone paints late 90s Zimbabwe in vibrant brushstrokes, while making us question his mental well being. Within the first few chapters it's clear that The Mad is a presentation of Mapenzi with nothing lost in translation.

"When you find yourself being asked when you will return, don’t think it is a sign of popularity. Sometimes people look forward to their freedom in your absence. So, now that I am going, don’t bother to ask me any questions because I have no answers for you. Just know that I will be back." - extract from The Mad

From Hamundigone's introduction there is a dive into characters just as vibrant as him, if not in personality then in the complexity of their lives. The Mad spins a web that touches on themes of culture, identity, homophobia, gender based violence, the liberation struggle, substance abuse and the AIDS pandemic. It is gripping yet laced with humour even in the most heartbreaking of moments. 

Through the lives of several individuals we travel through love, heartbreak, hope, while living in a repressed society. The fortunes of the country are expressed through a dog that changes names from Salisbury to Harare, and somehow strikes up a friendship with Hamundigone. The argument of cultural erosion vs needed adaptation is regularly put forward, along with a display of government inadequacies.

A novel 25+ years old yet still effervescent in its social commentary and satire. The stigma and fear mongering that gripped society in the 90s as depicted by The Mad, is almost exact mirror what happened during the world's most recent pandemic. A fact that shows us how well Mabasa captures Zimbabwean culture and the well entrenched underlying beliefs that guide Zimbabweans. 

The novel showcases both the brilliance of Ignatius Mabasa as a writer and J. Tsitsi Mutiti as a translator. A must read novel in every context.

Title: The Mad
Authors: Ignatius T. Mabasa
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Carnelian Heart Publishing & amaBooks Publishers

The Mad is available across all major book selling platforms and locally in Zimbabwe from Book Fantastics.

The Mad chosen as one of the '100 Notable African Books of 2025'

 

Brittle Paper have included Ignatius Mabasa's The Mad in its list of 100 Notable African Books of 2025

(https://brittlepaper.com/100-notable-african-books-of-2025/), saying 'Originally published in Shona as Mapenzi, this milestone of Zimbabwean literature finally receives a fearless English translation.' The translation, by J. Tsitsi Mutiti, follows the original novel in being recognised - Mapenzi was featured in the Times Literary Supplement as 'one of the most significant novels to have come out of Africa.'

Brittle Paper is an online literary magazine for readers of African Literature. They are Africa’s premier online literary brand inspiring readers to explore and celebrate African literary experience in all its diversity.

The Mad is co-published in Zimbabwe and the United Kingdom by amaBooks Publishers and Carnelian Heart Publishing. The University of Georgia Press are to be publish the novel in North America in April 2026.

North America Cover

UK/Zimbabwe Cover

Ignatius T. Mabasa's The Mad reviewed by Pat Brickhill in the Zimbabwe Review

Getting through the 1990s

The 90s were a vibrant time of political and economic shifts. The 25-year-old State of Emergency was lifted and the Economic Structural Adjustment Programme (ESAP) was implemented. A new generation of young Zimbabweans had initiated radical ferment, students at the University of Zimbabwe “dared to dream of a freer world” and post independent writers emerged onto the literary scene. Among them was a young man named Ignatius T. Mabasa, who would write Mapenzi, a novel written in his mother tongue chiShona, which used the state of madness to ponder and reflect on the state of Zimbabwe. Mapenzi was published by College Press, Zimbabwe in 1999.

The Mad, which was launched in Harare at the National Gallery in October 2025, is an English translation of Mapenzi. It has been described as a novel that uses reality, poverty, irony, humour and ridicule to paint a poignant picture of the struggles of Zimbabweans in the 1990s. The protagonist and central character is a war vet named Hamundigone. I found it fascinating that his Chimurenga name Hamundigone can itself be translated to characterise the protagonist as one who cannot be subdued or conquered; he can be described as a notorious character – someone who wins against overwhelming circumstances usually caused by the community around him.

Fired

The story opens with Hamundigone having been fired from his role as a teacher because of his actions. He is accused of being unstable, or being mad (The fact that he impregnated a schoolgirl does not appear to have been a factor in his dismissal). Hamundigone is travelling to Harare in a kombi. He speaks, sometimes to his fellow travellers, and sometimes he just speaks and the reader discovers more not only about him but also about the world around him.

“As you see me, I have been through much and much has been through me.

Zimbabwe has mauled me so that even today the wounds remain unhealed

and septic like the scars I brought back from Mozambique after the war. 

Zimbabwe has scooped out my spirit, the same way you do as when digging a grave.”

Using madness

People who are deemed to be ‘mad’ are unwanted travelling companions. I commend Ignatius Mabasa in his use of madness to transcend the self-censorship of many early post-independence writers. He presents us with a strong and often intimidating character who has no filter in what he says and whose utterings have the ability to generate empathy, exasperation and dislike from the reader in equal measure. At the same time we see him as a vulnerable human being reduced to eating from a rubbish bin.

Other characters like Magi, Bunny, Maud, VC, Mai Jazz and Kundai are first introduced then woven into the story. We discover titbits of information about their lives. We read about the struggles of financially unsupported university students and the lengths to which they go to survive. The connections wax and wane as the story moves forward and the reader discovers they are linked in a variety of ways that continue to evolve.  

Humour is included in the bleakness as we meet Salisbury, a white-owned dog who is left to Mai Jazz after his owners have fled the newly independent country. 

Learning to survive

Mai Jazz becomes the political commissar in a ZANU(PF) Women’s League Branch and when the city is renamed Harare, Salisbury the dog becomes Harare as well. His life changes dramatically but he soon learns he must survive or die and starts to eat sadza and to find food where he can.

While the writing has been accused by some as being fragmented and confusing at times I did not find it so. I immersed myself completely in The Mad. And as I read I remembered the crazy 1990s. At times the memory was painful: the beginnings and subsequent devastation of AIDS were so frightening. Rumours about the ‘short illness’ spread through Harare, and death became more and more familiar. Zimbabweans had to learn to hustle. The Mad is the terrifyingly familiar past of those who lived, and continue to live in Zimbabwe. 

'Sanity is a very strange commodity'

Critic Kizito Muchemwa once said: “Sanity is a very strange commodity in the fictional world created by the new generation of storytellers.” Mabasa uses Hamundigone’s madness to allow him to ‘fearlessly blame the government’ and to speak openly and honestly about ‘the mental and physical anguish experienced by Zimbabweans in the 1990s, where the impact of the beginnings of the economic decline affected everyone. My son Liam, who was a pupil at Blakiston Primary School in Harare, told me that he and fellow students used to scratch out certain letters on their Eversharp pens so that the pens read ‘ESAP’. It is a sobering experience to look back on those times. 

The Mad reminded me that even in the most difficult of times people are resiliently trying to live their best lives. One of the many strengths of this novel is that, through this story, I feel that I have ‘time travelled’ back to those times. 

Captivated

I was fascinated to read that the original novel Mapenzi had been translated twice – once by author Tendai Huchu and now by Joyce Tsitsi Mutiti. I believe she succeeded in her task “to ferry the spirit of the book”. As a non-Shona speaker I am unable to comment much on aspects of translation except to note that it was Mutiti’s translation that ‘spoke to Mabasa’s heart’, as the author has stated in an interview. 

As I finished reading The Mad I was so captivated by the book that I immediately sent a message to publisher Jane Morris to let her know that I found it to be an incredible read. I believe it to be a book that should be widely read – and I would recommend it thoroughly. My only regret is that I am unlikely to ever be able to read the original Mapenzi. 

The Mad is co-published in the United Kingdom and in Zimbabwe by amaBooks Publishers and Carnelian Heart Publishing. 

It is available in Zimbabwe through Book Fantastics (@bookfantastics), and in the United Kingdom through Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/Mad-Ignatius-T-Mabasa/dp/1914287967) or through Carnelian Heart Publishing (https://carnelianheartpublishing.co.uk/product/the-mad/)

John Eppel at the Bulawayo Book Club

John Eppel will be at the Bulawayo Book Club on 29 November to discuss his novel Hatchings.

It is New Year in Bulawayo, and anybody who is anybody is out celebrating.

Based on Alexander Pope's dictum that 'those who are ashamed of nothing else are so of being ridiculous', Hatchings sets out to ridicule people of all races who abuse power - behind the pulpit, the podium, and the paint brush.

The novel, whose central metaphor is baby-dumping, is set on New Year's Eve for good reason: it's the time when powermongers are at their most self-indulgent, most exposed. It is precisely the time when we see how much alike they are. In Hatchings, this similarity between the left and the right, between church and state, between black and white - so obsessed with their own moral worthiness, so quick to inflict their sanctimony on us all - is demonstrated by the fact that they all, quite literally, dance to the same tune.

'Beneath the scurrility, this is a profoundly romantic novel, it tells of a touching love story between a young white couple who are saved from the prevailing Philistinism and corruption by two things - a love of English literature and a love of the Matopos.'

Terence Ranger in The Zimbabwean Review

'The book is about exploitation, meanness; and it's about loveliness'

Southern African Review of Books

amaBooks are fortunate to have published two novels, Hatchings and the translation into English of Ignatius Mabasa's Mapenzi as The Mad, that were chosen in the Times Literary Supplement as two of 'the most significant novels to have come out of Africa.

 

Mabasa, Vazhure carry Zimbabwean art to the world

Elliot Ziwira's article in The Herald on the launch of Ignatius Mabasa's The Mad and the opening of Samantha Vezhure's exhibition Nzwisa.

https://www.heraldonline.co.zw/mabasa-vazhure-carry-zimbabwean-art-to-the-world/

THERE are moments when Zimbabwe’s creative spirit refuses to be contained; instants when its words, colours and rhythms transcend borders, languages, and the limits of genre.

The past two weeks offered two such moments.

These are the launch of “The Mad”, Ignatius Mabasa’s English translation of his 1999 Shona classic “Mapenzi” in Harare on October 10, and the opening of “Nzwisa”, the debut solo exhibition by bilingual writer and painter Samantha Rumbidzai Vazhure, a week later.

Though different in medium, with Mabasa’s in the printed word and Vazhure’s in textured acrylic, both events celebrate the same thing. It is the unrelenting will of Zimbabwean artists to speak in their own voices, on their own terms, and to the world at large.

The artists insist that literature and art are not parallel roads but intersecting paths in the ongoing conversation about identity, collective memory, and belonging.

When Mabasa stood before the audience at the launch of “The Mad” book lovers knew that he was not simply introducing a translation. He was introducing a movement.

For a man who did his Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) thesis at Rhodes University, South Africa, in Shona to “decolonise knowledge” and let it “speak to the people,” the translation of “Mapenzi”, his audacious, surrealist exploration of post-independence disillusionment, into English is not a retreat from that principle.

Rather, it is its extension.

Mabasa began writing “Mapenzi” as a student at 22, during the radical ferment of the 1990s at the University of Zimbabwe. Those were the years of radicalism, when students dared to dream of a freer world and writers sought new idioms.

The novel’s title, “The Mad” captured that spirit. It is a kind of madness that equates to rebellion—madness as muse, madness as resistance, and madness as truth-telling.

It reflects on how mental illness, though sensitive and serious an issue, emerges beyond affliction to become a metaphor within the imaginative and often anarchic world of artistic expression.

For both spectacle and insight, artists, especially modernists, like Mabasa, find something almost seductively resonant in the idea of losing one’s mind. 

Madness, in the creative consciousness, is not simply a breakdown of the rational self. It is a way of seeing, an alternative mode of perception that unveils hidden truths.

It offers the artist a lens through which to dissect a diseased society, peel back the veneer of order, and expose the chaos bubbling beneath. In this light, madness is not a condition but a commentary.

As critic Kizito Muchemwa (2002) puts it, “Sanity is a very strange commodity in the fictional world created by the new generation of storytellers.”

This strangeness is rooted in the dissonance between the polished appearance of modern life and its deeper, more fractured reality. To speak truthfully about the human condition today, its loneliness, alienation, and existential disillusionment, artists often turn to madness, both as a theme and a symbolic tool.

Modernists are obsessed with fracture, loss, and dislocation. Their worlds are dream-like, fragmented, sometimes terrifying, and often riddled with the psychic debris of failed utopias.

In Zimbabwean literature, this obsession is profoundly felt. Writers like Memory Chirere, Ignatius Mabasa, Shimmer Chinodya, Clement Chihota, Robert Muponde, Stanley Mupfudza, and Brian Chikwava, among others, channel modernist impulses to probe national identity, despair, and deferred hope.

Their literary worlds are littered with ghosts of colonialism, war, economic quagmire, and betrayed dreams.

That is why Tsitsi Mutiti’s translation of Mabasa’s “Mapenzi” is crucial. 

In “The Mad”, rendered into English by Mutiti after earlier efforts by Tendai Huchu, the madness is not lost but is rather reimagined.

Mutiti explained that her task was “to ferry the spirit of the book,” not just its words.

That phrase alone captures the soul of literary translation: the delicate act of carrying tone, rhythm, and cultural memory across linguistic borders without draining it of its pulse.

Mabasa confessed that early translation drafts felt “too clean, too careful,” stripping away the absurdities that gave “Mapenzi” its wild energy. 

However, in the final version the balance between fidelity and freedom is restored. The English language becomes a new drumbeat for the same song: raw, unpredictable, and deeply Zimbabwean.

Memory Chirere called Mutiti’s translation of “Mapenzi” a “great piece of work” that stands “on its own the way an original piece does”.

He added: “Mutiti’s work is amazing when you realise that she is coming from the sciences, and has little or no training in translation.”

Therefore, the launch of “The Mad” marks more than a literary milestone.

It positions Zimbabwean literature squarely within the global conversation on translation, identity, and decolonial aesthetics. For too long, African literature in English has been framed through the gaze of the outsider—what Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie once called “the single story.”

Mabasa’s act of translating his work, guided by his own vision, asserts agency over that narrative.

It tells the world that Zimbabwe’s stories do not need to be discovered. They only need to be heard.

On October 17, another Zimbabwean voice spoke across continents. This time in colour, texture, and rhythm. In the tranquil setting of PaMoyo Gallery in Harare, Samantha Rumbidzai Vazhure unveiled “Nzwisa”, her debut solo exhibition which ends today.

The title itself, “Nzwisa”, invites the audience into a meditative space where art becomes a form of hearing as much as seeing. Vazhure, a self-taught painter and bilingual author, merges the sacred landscapes of Zimbabwe with the pastoral quiet of the Welsh countryside where she now lives.

In her canvases, past and present, home and exile, converge like echoes in a valley.

Each painting carries a story through visual poems that speak to identity, spirituality, and love.

In “Munhu Wangu” (2025), she captures tenderness and intimacy as communion rather than possession, while “Iwewe neni” delves into togetherness beyond the physical, suggesting a spiritual tether that defies space and circumstance.

Her piece “In the Embraces of Struggle” (2025) revisits Dambudzo Marechera’s “The House of Hunger”, turning his haunting words into a visual metaphor of intertwined histories in which black and white, coloniser and colonised, are locked forever in an unfinished embrace.

Yet, as in Marechera’s prose, there is resilience in the chaos.

In “Vapfuri Vemhangura” (2025) Vazhure honours skilled artisans of ancient Zimbabwean societies. The artwork celebrates craftsmanship, labour, and ingenuity, positioning metallurgy as both cultural heritage and a symbol of human inventiveness through the transformation of raw elements.

In traditional lore, the Soko Vhudzijena clan are praised as expert iron smelters (mhizha) who migrated from Hwedza, Mashonaland East. Similarly, the Shumba clan are said to have travelled from Mutoko through Hwedza to settle in Chivi—possibly Soko descendants who adopted the Shumba totem for strategic reasons.

Drawing inspiration from these ancestral migrations, which coincided with the southward spread of Iron Age farming, the painting depicts three men departing an iron-smelting site under the watchful protection of Chapungu, the sacred Bateleur eagle.

Though modest in scale, “Silence” (2024) communicates deep emotion through texture and tone. Set against a warm yellow background, the composition features a pair of lips—still, yet echoing the weight of words left unspoken. To one side, a mosaic of orange, red, mauve, and violet-blue textures evoke the richness and intricacy of African artistic expression.

The contrast between the vivid detailing and the muted backdrop creates an atmosphere of quiet intensity, suggesting that silence itself can carry strength, depth, and layered meaning beyond what speech can capture.

“Ziroto” (2025) speaks powerfully to Zimbabwe’s cultural psyche. Inspired by the prophecy of Chaminuka, who foresaw the coming of Europeans (those without knees), the artwork becomes a lament for historical silence.

“Who controls remembrance?” the painting seems to ask. “What happens when even our descendants no longer recognise us?”

Vazhure’s art, much like Mabasa’s writing, is an act of remembrance. It is a reclamation of the narrative from erasure. That her limited-edition prints are made from 3D scans of original paintings speaks symbolically to preservation; the attempt to retain texture and authenticity even in reproduction.

Her journey, from literary activist, author and publisher to painter since 2022, testifies to the interconnectedness of Zimbabwe’s creative spheres. Just as Mabasa moves between orality, prose, and translation, Vazhure moves between page and canvas, word and colour, as well as past and future.

Placed side by side, Mabasa’s “The Mad” and Vazhure’s “Nzwisa” demonstrate that Zimbabwe’s arts are entering a new epoch that refuses to separate literature from visual culture, intellect from emotion, or the local from the global.

Both artists confront the politics of visibility. Mabasa translates himself into English not for validation, but to occupy space in a language that once claimed ownership of his world.

On the other hand, Vazhure paints the landscapes of her memory, transforming nostalgia into resistance. In both cases, art becomes both expression and reclamation.

Their works explore a growing recognition that Zimbabwe’s literary and artistic output cannot thrive in isolation.

Collaboration between writers, translators, painters, musicians, and cultural institutions is what builds sustainable creative economies. Live music by Hope Masike at “Nzwisa” provides a sensory bridge between sound and sight—a fitting echo of Mabasa’s call for knowledge that “speaks to the people.”

Both events are crucial cultural signposts, showing how Zimbabwean art is reinventing itself as both local and global, traditional and experimental, as well as reflective and confrontational.

When one listens carefully, as “Nzwisa” urges, and reads deeply, as “The Mad” demands, one realises that both Mabasa and Vazhure are engaged in the same sacred act of translating Zimbabwe’s soul.

Indeed, creativity, like memory, is never static. It shifts form, crosses oceans, and speaks in tongues. Whether through a translated novel that carries the rhythms of Shona madness into English syntax, or through brushstrokes that merge ancestral prophecy with modern abstraction, the message is the same.

Zimbabwe’s stories still matter, and they are still being told, boldly, beautifully, and in full colour.

Even though the applause may fade at book launches and gallery openings, the larger work continues. The collective task is to sustain spaces like the National Gallery of Zimbabwe and PaMoyo Gallery to nurture publishers like Carnelian Heart, to support translators and editors such as Mutiti who make language porous, and to celebrate writers who, like Mabasa, keep pushing the boundaries of possibility.

In the end, every page turned and every canvas unveiled carries a quiet command—listen. Listen to the voices of those who dare to translate dreams into being. Listen to the madness that births meaning, and listen to Zimbabwe speaking to both itself and the world.

The Mad is co-published in Zimbabwe and the United Kingdom by amaBooks Publishers and Carnelian Heart Publishing.

Copies of the book are available in Zimbabwe through Book Fantastics (contact through @bookfantastics on Instagram, or @Book_Fantastics on X) and in the UK through Amazon (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mad-Ignatius-T-Mabasa/dp/1914287967/) or through carnelianheartpublishing.co.uk. It will be available next year in North America through the University of Georgia Press.

Ignatius Mabasa nominated for the 2026 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for Storytelling

 

Renowned Zimbabwean author and storyteller
Ignatius Mabasa has been nominated for the 2026 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award for storytelling. 

The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award is an international children's literary award established by the Swedish government in 2002 to honour the Swedish children's author Astrid Lindgren (1907–2002) and to promote every child's right to great stories. This global award is given annually to a person or organisation for their outstanding contribution to children's and young adult literature.

The prize is five million SEK (about US$500,000), making it the richest award in children's literature and one of the richest literary prizes in the world.