Of The Pieces Of Others In Me

• Robert Mugabe

Our former president had his faults and right now though it does seem like his legacy was to doom this nation to darkness but emotion clouds our judgement, as we focus on only the negative but I am sure history will one day remember him not just as another African dictator who became a villain of his story and exiting power in disgrace after a coup that was not a coup. Leading a revolution is not an easy thing and the same qualities that make one a very good revolutionary leader also make one terrible once the revolution has passed, I doubt few people ever set out thinking I want to rule with an iron fist, even as they burn the very thing they wish to save, leaving only ashes.

Did he not help liberate the country from colonial oppression, yes he dared, was Zimbabwe the first and probably last country to take its land back from the settlers, yes we dared (sure, it could have been better executed less brutal and land redistributed non-partisanally ) and that is the price we are paying today, The Powers That Be could not let us be a success story, it would have set a very bad precedence in Africa, and they needed to make an example of us.

I have heard people from other African countries discuss “taking back their land” and then someone cautions “hey you want us to end up like Zimbabwe”

I am not saying he did not have his faults, I am not even saying he was a good president I am just saying he was a man who dared…

• Octavia Estelle Butler

I never knew of her, until a blogging, Candice read a story on my blog and mentioned in passing how a character was reminiscent of Octavia Butler’s creation Doro from Wild Seed (The Patternist Series) . I set out to find this hitherto unknown character and the author behind the creation. I immediately fell in love, read all of her books, looked for more and was crushed to discover she had died in 2006. A great author never really dies, they are immortal alive in between the words they leave behind.

am currently binge reading all the books by Octavia E. Butler a phenomenal writer ^_^
good writers never die, they are immortal. 😉

— ~B 🇿🇼 (@Beatonm5) August 25, 2015

• Nnedi Okorafor

After I discovered Octavia Butler, I hungered to read sci-fi and fantasy with an Afrocentric feel and I stumbled on Nnedi’s books. Nnedi’s writing embraces culture, fantasy; a marriage of magic and science. I have always loved works of high fantasy but what I really wanted was to have fantasy that could fit in with the everyday world around me, set in the streets around me, based on the myths and legends from my own tradition.

"theres witchcraft in science and a science to witchcraft"

– @Nnedi

— ~B 🇿🇼 (@Beatonm5) July 12, 2018

Maybe it’s a hair thing

• Oliver Mtukdzi

The late Oliver Mtukdzi the man with talking guitar

With a musical career spanning close to 4 decades; its no surprise he had a song for every occasion, you can read my tribute post here

• Novuyo Rosa Tshuma

Novuyo Tshuma’s book House of Stone gives a fictionalized account of Zimbabwe’s history particularly hinged upon a dark part of our history under former president Mugabe’s Regime. She tackles this rarely untold narrative with a humour and sensitivity balancing fact and fiction to precision.

I want to write, not just whimsical works of fantasy but something that informs, teaches and preserves aspects of my past…

Here I am walking around collecting pieces of others and becoming more

~B