A Critical Perspective on the Zimbabwean Short Story in English
Tinashe Mushakavanhu
‘Short stories in English have long been the poor relations of Zimbabwean literature’, T.O. McLoughlin once observed.
Critics and commentators in the Zimbabwean literary discourse have paid scant attention to the short story and have treated it as a footnote to the novel, some kind of practice ground for the more serious business of writing novels. And yet, the short story engenders vital issues that have contemporary relevance.
The development of the short story in Zimbabwe as a separate, concentrated short form of literature reveals remarkable vitality, and it holds up in a natural manner as an effective mirror to the Zimbabwean way of life. The intensity of the form comes from its subjective points of view, pervasive imagery, controlled tone and ellipsis, and as a matter of fact, the Zimbabwean short story presents human experience in its most distilled essence.
In Zimbabwe the history of the short story can be traced back to three representative writers in Charles Mungoshi, Dambudzo Marechera and Stanley Nyamfukudza respectively as they published the first individual short story collections in that line. These three writers automatically become ‘the fore-bearers’ of the short story genre in Zimbabwean fiction in English.
Charles Mungoshi became the first black writer from Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) to publish a short story collection, Coming of the Dry Season, in 1972. With Mungoshi the Zimbabwean short story in English germinated in the form of homely anecdotes drawn from colonial experiences. The Rhodesian Board subsequently banned Mungoshi’s book in 1975 because one of the stories, ‘The Accident’, had subtle implications on the political order of the day. Thus Mungoshi employs irony and understatement in his storiesto subvert censorship.
It, however took Dambudzo Marechera in his first collection, The House of Hunger (1978) to shock the Zimbabwean readership into realizing that short fiction is a powerful medium in its own right and with its own peculiar qualities. Marechera used the short story as a literary vehicle for a more individual expression of personal experience. And to some extent, it is the continued popularity and influence of Dambudzo Marechera that has resulted in the insurgence of the short story as an expressive genre in post-colonial Zimbabwe.
Stanley Nyamfukudza’s Aftermaths (1983) mainly deals, with the mental and physical implications of independence in Zimbabwe. And with Nyamfukudza, the Zimbabwean short story widened in its range of subject matter and achieved greater depth.
Zimbabwe has not yet produced a large body of short stories, though several writers in the post-1980 period are developing strongly and only known for single works or as contributors to literary magazines, newspapers and anthologies. A few writers like Charles Mungoshi, Stanley Nyamfukudza, Barbara Makhalisa, Alexander Kanengoni, Yvonne Vera, Shimmer Chinodya, David Mungoshi, Melissa Tandiwe Myambo, Memory Chirere, Wonder Guchu and more recently Christopher Mlalazi, Petina Gappah and young Lawrence Hoba.
The amount of short fiction published is therefore relatively small. But, this is not indicative of the levels of creativity in Zimbabwe as many young people are writing under the auspices of Budding Writers Association of Zimbabwe (BWAZ) and Zimbabwe Women Writers (ZWW). In addition, there are many white exponents of the short story genre in Zimbabwe such as Rory Kilalea, John Eppel, Alexandra Fuller, Catherine Buckle and Geoff Hill, who have gone to win or shortlisted for international prizes such as the Caine Prize for Writing in Africa and the Commonwealth Short Story Foundation prize. Then we have the prodigious contributors of anthologists, Irene Staunton and Jane Morris who, between them, have produced almost a dozen short story anthologies including several writers.
Early themes in the short story as they are clearly represented in T.O. McLoughlin’s Sounds of Snapping Wire (1990), the first major multi-authored collection after independence, question post-colonial society on the promises that were made before independence, comparing the hopes and dreams of the freedom fighters and their supporters to the sometimes crude and cruel facts they are now confronted with. As some of the stories were written before independence, there’s repetition of themes, where writers are still focusing on the confrontation against the colonial system and its attendant values. In the 1990’s, there is a shift of focus. Urbanization with all its effects: disintegration of the family, alienation, anonymity, decay, immorality become prevailing themes in short fiction in Zimbabwe.
Whereas novels and poetry were the most convenient forms to articulate cultural nationalism and political sovereignty, the Zimbabwean short story has emerged to be what Ben Okri aptly described as “the perfect form for the age we live in.” The Zimbabwean society is sick and literature, particularly the short story, can save it. The temperament of the creative writer in independent Zimbabwe evolves out of a preoccupation with concrete, practical matters, and a tendency to rush and hurry, thus demanding that its literature be terse and to the point. And, since most of the young writers who are gaining prominence today work other jobs and do not depend on writing as a vocation of living, they only write when they have time and this could be one major reason why the short story has been adopted as a convenient medium of fictional expression.
The Zimbabwean short story represents a reaction against the social strenuousness of the current milieu because in essence, literature is not merely a reflection of the socio-economic relationships of society nor an urgent message to contemporaries, but a record of subtle craftsmanship working at the focus of the most vital aspects of the writer’s existence and capturing a unique, fugitive and imaginative vision.
Early writers had been mainly concerned with the past, the younger writers have shifted their interest and attention to the present. The reasons for the pessimistic and seemingly unpatriotic tone in much of the literature produced in the 1990s to the present day have become clear. Urbanization, alienation and disillusionment account for the highly individualistic and sceptical outlook. Theirs is a free, modern, open-minded view of society unfettered by political biases. In their short fiction, the young writers try to come to terms with the rapidly changing conditions of the post-colonial character in Zimbabwe.
But, what is also significantly noticeable in most published anthologies is little representation by women writers. Is the Zimbabwean short story a preserved literary outlet for the male writer only? It is in Writing Still (2003) edited by Irene Staunton, a woman, that the vexious problem of gender representation is somewhat addressed, but it is interesting to see how these women writers grapple with the short story. What vision of the world do these women contribute, and how does it compare with the vision we associate with Zimbabwean literature, a literature so deeply preoccupied with the struggles of men? How do these women relate to this predominantly male tradition, do they identify with it, adapt it to their needs, reject it, or ignore it? These questions provide new and engaging issues.
The popularity of the short story in recent years is not only circumstantial but significant as well. Literary forms and styles are contextually produced and are meant to reflect the different ways in which writers respond to, organize and interpret their condition. It is generally agreed that each generation of writers respond to the central human questions of its age. And this dialectical truth is qualified by Vassily Novikov (1974) a Russian literary scholar:
Literature develops along with life as writers try to meet the challenges of their time, tell the readers the truth about themselves, the world and the current events, and voice their concern about the future, the truth without which mankind cannot advance.
Novikov further adds that, “every method, style, trend and genre produces its own set of devices and its own “truthfulness.” However, in Zimbabwe there is a dearth of critical appreciation and focus on the short story genre. There is, in fact, not one single study in Zimbabwean literature that specifically examines the short story genre in detail. Pioneering critical works by leading academics like Kizito Muchemwa, George Kahari, Musaemura Zimunya, Ranga Zinyemba, Rudo Gaidzanwa, Flora Veit-Wild, Rino Zhuwarara, Robert Muponde and Ranka Primorac have overlooked the importance of the short story.
Their studies have limited focus. The writers’ dwell more on thematic and historical concerns, especially the sociological and cultural relevance of literary works produced in Zimbabwe, creating what Maurice Vambe terms, ‘the poverty of theory in Zimbabwean literature.’ In some instances, the critics focus on particular genres and not the short story. When I was an undergraduate a few years ago I produced a sincere attempt towards filling that gap, as this is an area where exploratory research is still relevant. Heather McClave’s observation twenty-nine years ago remains true as it fully explains this void:
To date, short stories have never received the detailed academic attention devoted to poetry, plays, essays, and novels; but then in the history of literature they are comparatively new to the scene.
But such an undertaking was difficult and somewhat limited by lack of immediate critical reference on the Zimbabwean short story, and thus to some extent, relied on Western paradigms that govern the short story in general. Judging by recent publishing trends in Zimbabwe, the short story has been the pulse of literary creativity in the country.
This article is extracted from my BA English dissertation focusing on the Zimbabwean short story in English submitted at the Midlands State University in Zimbabwe.