Zakes's Books

The Heart of Redness

By: Zakes Mda

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A startling novel by the leading writer of the new South Africa In The Heart of Redness -- shortlisted for the prestigious Commonwealth Writers Prize -- Zakes Mda sets a story of South African village life against a notorious episode from the country's past. The result is a novel of great scope and deep human feeling, of passion and reconciliation. As the novel opens Camugu, who left for America during apartheid, has returned to Johannesburg. Disillusioned by the problems of the new democracy, he follows his "famous lust" to Qolorha on the remote Eastern Cape. There in the nineteenth century a teenage prophetess named Nonqawuse commanded the Xhosa people to kill their cattle and burn their crops, promising that once they did so the spirits of their ancestors would rise and drive the occupying English into the ocean. The failed prophecy split the Xhosa into Believers and Unbelievers, dividing brother from brother, wife from husband, with devastating consequences. One hundred fifty years later, the two groups' decendants are at odds over plans to build a vast casino and tourist resort in the village, and Camugu is soon drawn into their heritage and their future -- and into a bizarre love triangle as well. The Heart of Redness is a seamless weave of history, myth, and realist fiction. It is, arguably, the first great novel of the new South Africa -- a triumph of imaginative and historical writing.

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Page Count

288

Publisher

Macmillan + ORM

Published Date

ISBN 10

0374708215

ISBN 13

9780374708214

The Zulus of New York

By: Zakes Mda

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The Zulus of New York

By: Zakes Mda

The Great Farini would stride on to the stage and announce, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, and now for the highlight of the day, the ferocious Zulus.’ The impresario Farini introduced Em-Pee and his troupe to his kind of show business, and now they must earn their bread. In 1885 in a bustling New York City, they are the performers who know the true Zulu dances, while all around them fraudsters perform silly jigs. Reports on the Anglo-Zulu War portrayed King Cetshwayo as infamous, and audiences in London and New York flock to see his kin. What the gawking spectators don’t know is that Em-Pee once carried nothing but his spear and shield, when he had to flee his king. But amid the city’s squalid vaudeville acts appears a vision that leaves Em-Pee breathless: in a cage in Madison Square Park is Acol, a Dinka princess on display. For Em-Pee, it is love at first sight, though Acol is not free to love anyone back.

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Page Count

104

Publisher

Penguin Random House South Africa

Published Date

ISBN 10

141521039X

ISBN 13

9781415210390

Cion

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

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Cion

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

The boys' story alternates with Toloki's own, and these parallel adventures cast a new light on America in the twenty-first century, and on an undiscovered legacy of the Civil War and the Underground Railroad."--BOOK JACKET.

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Page Count

328

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0312427069

ISBN 13

9780312427061

The Whale Caller

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

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The Whale Caller

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

A voice for which one should feel not only affection but admiration." --The New York Times The Whale Caller, Zakes Mda's fifth novel, is his most enchanting and accessible book yet-a romantic comedy of sorts in which the changing face of post-apartheid South Africa is revealed through prodigious, lyrical storytelling. As the novel opens, the seaside village of Hermanus, on the country's west coast, is overrun with whale watchers-foreign tourists wearing floral shirts and toting expensive binoculars, determined to see whales in their natural habitat. But when the tourists have gone home, the Whale Caller lingers at the shoreline, wooing a whale he calls Sharisha with cries from a kelp horn. When Sharisha fails to appear for weeks on end, the Whale Caller frets like a jealous lover-oblivious to the fact that the town drunk, Saluni, a woman who wears a silk dress and red stiletto heels, is infatuated with him. After much ado-which Mda relates with great relish-the two misfits fall in love. But each of them is ill equipped for romance, and their on-again, off-again relationship suggests something of the fitful nature of change in post-apartheid South Africa, where just living from one day to the next can be challenge enough. Mda has spoken of the end of apartheid as a lifting of the South African novelist's burden to write on political subjects. With The Whale Caller, he has written a tender, charming novel-the work of a virtuoso among international writers.

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Page Count

242

Publisher

Macmillan + ORM

Published Date

ISBN 10

0374708193

ISBN 13

9780374708191

Ways of Dying

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

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Ways of Dying

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

Winner of the M-Net Book Prize Shortlisted for the CNA and Noma Awards In Ways of Dying, Zakes Mda's acclaimed first novel, Toloki is a "professional mourner" in a vast and violent city of the new South Africa. Day after day he attends funerals in the townships, dressed with dignity in a threadbare suit, cape, and battered top hat, to comfort the grieving families of the victims of the city's crime, racial hatred, and crippling poverty. At a Christmas day funeral for a young boy Toloki is reunited with Noria, a woman from his village. Together they help each other to heal the past, and as their story interweaves with those of their acquaintances this elegant short novel provides a magical and painful picture of South Africa today. Ways of Dying was awarded South Africa's prestigious M-Net Book Prize, awarded by the TV channel M-Net to books written in one of South Africa's official languages, and was shortlisted for the Central News Agency (CNA) Award and the Noma Award, an Africa-wide prize founded by Shoichi Noma, onetime president of Kodansha International.

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Page Count

213

Publisher

Picador

Published Date

ISBN 10

0374708282

ISBN 13

9780374708283

The Madonna of Excelsior

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

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The Madonna of Excelsior

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

A new novel by a towering presence in contemporary South African literature In 1971, nineteen citizens of Excelsior in South Africa's white-ruled Free State were charged with breaking apartheid's Immorality Act, which forbade sex between blacks and whites. Taking this case as raw material for his alchemic imagination, Zakes Mda tells the story of a family at the heart of the scandal -and of a country in which apartheid concealed interracial liaisons of every kind. Niki, the fallen madonna, transgresses boundaries for the sake of love; her choices have repercussions in the lives of her black son and mixed-race daughter, who come of age in post-apartheid South Africa, where freedom prompts them to reexamine their country's troubled history at first hand. By turns earthy, witty, and tragic, The Madonna of Excelsior is a brilliant depiction of life in South Africa and of the dramatic changes between the 1970s and the present.

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Page Count

270

Publisher

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published Date

ISBN 10

0374708231

ISBN 13

9780374708238

She Plays with the Darkness

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

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She Plays with the Darkness

A Novel

By: Zakes Mda

In a mountain village in Lesotho, the beautiful Dikosha lives for, setting herself apart from her fellow villagers. Her brother, Radisene, struggles amid political upheaval to find a life for himself. As the years pass, Radisene's fortunes rise and fall in the city, while Dikosha remains in the village, never leaving and never aging.

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228

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

031242325X

ISBN 13

9780312423254

Fools, Bells and the Habit of Eating

Three Satires

By: Zakes Mda

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Fools, Bells and the Habit of Eating

Three Satires

By: Zakes Mda

Cupidity, corruption and conciliation are the themes of the three plays in this collection from one of South Africa’s leading writes. The Mother of all Eating, a one-hander, with its central character a corrupt Lesotho official, is a grinding satire on materialism in which the protagonist gets his come-uppance. You Fool, How Can the Sky Fall? is an unbridled study in grotesquerie, reflecting a belief, traceable throughout Mda’s work, that government by those who inherit a revolution is almost inevitably, in the first decade or two, hijacked by the smart operators. The Bells of Amersfoort, with its graphic portrayal of the isolation imposed by exile, picks up on the themes of the other two plays but adds to them the concept of ‘healing’, both of the soul and of the land, in a lyrical work which holds out more hope than do its companions in this volume. The plays are introduced by Rob Amato, who directed much of Mda’s earlier work.

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Page Count

184

Publisher

Wits University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1868143775

ISBN 13

9781868143771

And the Girls in their Sunday Dresses

Four Works

By: Zakes Mda

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And the Girls in their Sunday Dresses

Four Works

By: Zakes Mda

Two very different women meet during a long wait to buy subsidized rice and discover they have more in common than their poverty; an old man and a child share a last loving waltz; a cynical, disabled gangster learns humanity from a committed social worker, and a young girl finds her missing father and her role in the political struggle. This collection of stage plays, one radio play and a cinepoem, captures the essence of Zakes Mda’s method as a dramatist- a slow but intimate process of revelation (on the part of the characters). It is an artistic cooperation of the most pleasurable kind.

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176

Publisher

Wits University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1868142221

ISBN 13

9781868142224

Nothing but the Truth

A play

By: John Kani,Zakes Mda

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Nothing but the Truth

A play

By: John Kani,Zakes Mda

An award-winning play about the relationship between brothers. Nothing but the Truth is the story of two brothers, of sibling rivalry, of exile, of memory and reconciliation, and the ambiguities of freedom. The play was John Kani's debut as sole playwright and was first performed in the Market Theatre in Johannesburg. It won the 2003 Fleur du Cap Award for best actor and best new South African play. In the same year Kani was also awarded a special Obie award for his extraordinary contribution to theatre in the USA.

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NYU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

186814657X

ISBN 13

9781868146574

Ways of Dying

By: Zakes Mda

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Ways of Dying

By: Zakes Mda

Ways of Dying tells the story of the eccentric but dignified professional mourner, Toloki. His odyssey takes him from a rural village community to the shabby, vibrant outskirts of a contemporary South African city, where the tenderness that springs up between him and the beautiful and tragic Noria helps them to heal the past. By turns magical, brutal, and funny, this compelling work is a major new contribution to South African writing.

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212

Published Date

ISBN 10

0195714989

ISBN 13

9780195714982

The Whale Caller

By: Zakes Mda

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The Whale Caller

By: Zakes Mda

A story that is at once a haunting love story and a lament for a lost wilderness.

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298

Published Date

ISBN 10

1485903726

ISBN 13

9781485903727

Sometimes There Is a Void

Memoirs of an Outsider

By: Zakes Mda

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Sometimes There Is a Void

Memoirs of an Outsider

By: Zakes Mda

Chronicles the author's life as an artist, family man, and teacher against a backdrop of political turbulence in South Africa, providing coverage of such topics as his childhood exile, his three marriages, and the literature that inspired his achievements.

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Page Count

577

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0374280940

ISBN 13

9780374280949

She Plays with the Darkness

By: Zakes Mda,Zakes

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She Plays with the Darkness

By: Zakes Mda,Zakes

The author weaves a story of love and magic in the misty mountains, and of betrayal in the city. He is a humane writer, and a sensitive and inventive storyteller with the eye for absurdity and tenderness. In the twins of Ha Samane-especially in Dikosha, the dancing girl who never ages -- he has created characters who will live in our memory for many years to come. She plays with the Darkness is a first-rate literary experience.

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Page Count

165

Published Date

ISBN 10

0865436819

ISBN 13

9780865436817

Our Lady of Benoni

A play

By: Zakes Mda

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Our Lady of Benoni

A play

By: Zakes Mda

An innovative play tackling the role of patriarchy in South African culture Zakes Mda's satire is a kaleidoscopic display of the extremes to which men (and by implication women) are prepared to go in terms of valuing what is 'virginal'. Mda presents us with the consequences of transgression: that which is seen as polluted and judged to be dangerous to the good health and purity of a group, a society, a culture. Taboos, superstition, customs and moral ethics become the subjects of inquiry and are, at times, subjected to ribald satire. This play cuts into a virtuoso style of theatre that can in no way be confused with the objectives and methods of conventional realism. Mda establishes a unique style and tone that is innovative, entertaining and challenging. It fuses satirical elements derived from classical poetry with a modernist sensibility that synthesises Brechtian and Absurdist features of theatricality, using characters as types and montage. Above all, in this work there is a profound exploration of what it means to operate in the politically charged landscape that defines post-apartheid South Africa with its cultural pluralities and differentials in access to resources and agency. Stylistically adventurous and unafraid to deviate from conventionally accepted norms, Mda is iconoclastic in his handling of the ways in which attitudes to power, superstition, ethics and sex are constructed. The cultural discourse of patriarchy and the 'regime of truths' regarding ideals and taboos defining female sexuality, its obligations, and its custodianship are the focus of this play.

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Page Count

145

Publisher

NYU Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1868145948

ISBN 13

9781868145942

Black Diamond

By: Zakes Mda

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Black Diamond

By: Zakes Mda

Kristin Uys is a tough Roodepoort magistrate who lives alone with her cat. She is on a one-woman crusade to wipe out prostitution in the town for reasons that have personal significance for her. Although she is unable to convict the Visagie Brothers, Stevo and Shortie, on charges of running a brothel, she manages to nail Stevo for contempt of court and gives him a summary six-month sentence. From Diepkloof Prison, the outraged Stevo orchestrates his revenge against the magistrate, aided and abetted by his rather inept brother Shortie and his erstwhile nanny, Aunt Magda, who believes mass action will force the powers that be to release Stevo. Kristin receives menacing phone calls and her home is invaded and vandalised. Even her cat is threatened. The chief magistrate insists on assigning a bodyguard to protect her. To Kristin's consternation, security guard Don Mateza moves into her home and trails her everywhere. Nor does this suit Don's long-time girlfriend Tumi, former model and successful businesswoman, who is intent on turning Don into a Black Diamond sooner rather than later. And Don soon finds that his new assignment has unexpected complications which Tumi simply does not understand. In Black Diamond, Zakes Mda tackles every conceivable South African stereotype, skilfully (and with the lightest touch) turning them upside down and exposing their ironies, often hilariously. This is a clever, quirky novel that captures the essence of contemporary life in Gauteng and will resonate with all South Africans.

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Page Count

243

Publisher

Penguin Random House South Africa

Published Date

ISBN 10

0143027506

ISBN 13

9780143027508

She Plays with the Darkness

By: Zakes Mda,Zakes

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She Plays with the Darkness

By: Zakes Mda,Zakes

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165

Published Date

ISBN 10

0865436800

ISBN 13

9780865436800

Little Suns

By: Zakes Mda

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Little Suns

By: Zakes Mda

‘There are many suns,’ he said. ‘Each day has its own. Some are small, some are big. I’m named after the small ones.’ It is 1903. A lame and frail Malangana – ‘Little Suns’ – searches for his beloved Mthwakazi after many lonely years spent in Lesotho. Mthwakazi was the young woman he had fallen in love with twenty years earlier, before the assassination of Hamilton Hope ripped the two of them apart. Intertwined with Malangana’s story, is the account of Hope – a colonial magistrate who, in the late nineteenth century, was undermining the local kingdoms of the eastern Cape in order to bring them under the control of the British. It was he who wanted to coerce Malangana’s king and his people, the amaMpondomise, into joining his battle – a scheme Malangana’s conscience could not allow. Zakes Mda’s fine new novel Little Suns weaves the true events surrounding the death of Magistrate Hope into a touching story of love and perseverance that can transcend exile and strife.

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Page Count

226

Publisher

Penguin Random House South Africa

Published Date

ISBN 10

1415209057

ISBN 13

9781415209059

When People Play People

Development Communication Through Theatre

By: Zakes Mda

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When People Play People

Development Communication Through Theatre

By: Zakes Mda

There is a growing sense that existing media have failed to serve the purposes of development, and in particular have not reflected either the concerns or the needs of the rural majority in Third World countries. Theatre, however, is now being used as a way of increasing popular participation in the development process. This book examines these experiences of training extension workers in the use of theatre-for-development, and explores the author's own attempts-notably with the Marotholi Travelling Theatre in Lesotho - to develop a new model of theatrical communication.

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Zed Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1856492001

ISBN 13

9781856492003

Make Garbage Great

The Terracycle Family Guide to a Zero-Waste Lifestyle

By: Tom Szaky,Albe Zakes

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Make Garbage Great

The Terracycle Family Guide to a Zero-Waste Lifestyle

By: Tom Szaky,Albe Zakes

In this fun, pop culture exploration, two ecological entrepreneurs examine the materials we use in our daily lives, show how they impact the environment, and provide project ideas—from recycling to upcycling and more—to lessen our impact and protect our world. Jam-packed with information, more than 200 photographs and illustrations, and approximately twenty DIY projects, this engaging, graphic volume shows us how we all can cut down, reuse, and repurpose the garbage we produce. With its easy hands-on design, Make Garbage Great contains information, little known facts, compelling graphics, and colorful illustrations and photos on a variety of common household waste-stream materials: Plastics, Glass and Ceramics, Paper, Wood, Textiles, Metal, Rubber, and Organics. Tom Szaky, the founder of the award-winning nonprofit, environmental company TerraCycle, introduces each and explains what he’s learned about it in his personal life and with TerraCycle. He and Albe Zakes then provide a graphic historical timeline of each material's use in commercial goods—from how it’s manufactured to what happens when it’s throw out—an analysis of its impact on the environment now and tomorrow; suggestions for DIY projects to save it from the trash bin, and lists of helpful resources. They also include sidebars and definitions, fun and quirky facts, lists of reuse ideas, quotes, and illuminating interviews that add depth and insight. All of us have a responsibility to protect our environment. Informative and inspirational, Make Garbage Great shows us how to be creative custodians today—and for the rest of our lives.

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Harper Design

Published Date

ISBN 10

006234885X

ISBN 13

9780062348852

Sculptors of Mapungubwe

By: Zakes Mda

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Sculptors of Mapungubwe

By: Zakes Mda

In the timeless kingdom of Mapungubwe, the royal sculptor had two sons, Chata and Rendani. As they grew, so grew their rivalry--and their extraordinary talents. But while Rendani became a master carver of the animals that run in the wild hills and lush valleys of the land, Chata learned to carve fantastic beings from his dreams, creatures never before seen on the Earth. From this natural rivalry between brothers, Zakes Mda crafts an irresistibly rich fable of love and family. What makes the better art, perfect mimicry or inspiration? Who makes the better wife, a princess or a mysterious dancer? Ageless and contemporary, deceptive in its simplicity and mythical in its scope, The Sculptors of Mapungubwe encompasses all we know of love, envy, and the artist's primal power to forge art from nature and nature into art. Mda's newest novel will only strengthen his international reputation as one of the most trenchant voices of South Africa.

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ISBN 10

085742095X

ISBN 13

9780857420954

Wayfarers' Hymns

By: Zakes Mda

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Wayfarers' Hymns

By: Zakes Mda

Infused with rhythm and melody, Zakes Mda’s new novel invites you to travel from Lesotho’s Mountain Kingdom to the City of Gold through the history of famo. Famo music was born in the drinking dens of migrant mineworkers in Lesotho, where the men would sing to unwind after work, accompanied by the accordion, a drum and sometimes a bass. Meet the boy-child kheleke, a wandering musician, and his surprising sister Moliehi. Then sigh with pleasure at being reunited with Toloki, the professional mourner from Ways of Dying, and his beloved Noria. Passionate and ambitious, boy-child is a weaver of songs, and his own story is intertwined with the incredible yet true social history of the music: the Time of the Concertina and the Accordion, the wars of the famo gangs, and the battle for control of illegal mines. The end is always a journey – and what a journey this is!

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Page Count

236

Publisher

Penguin Random House South Africa

Published Date

ISBN 10

1415210896

ISBN 13

9781415210895

Rachel's Blue

By: Zakes Mda

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Rachel's Blue

By: Zakes Mda

What happens when a rapist fights for paternity rights over the rape-conceived child? Weaving together the personal struggles of its characters with the earth-deep worries of a small town, Rachel's Blue deftly pulls readers into a close-knit community only to show how suffocating such a community can be.

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Africa List

Published Date

ISBN 10

0857423320

ISBN 13

9780857423320

Justify the Enemy

Becoming Human in South Africa

By: Zakes Mda

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Justify the Enemy

Becoming Human in South Africa

By: Zakes Mda

This book is a collection of non-fiction by the prolific author Zakes Mda. It showcases his role as a public intellectual with the inclusion of public lectures, essays and media articles. Mda focuses on South Africa's history and the present, identity and belonging, the art of writing, human rights, global warming and why he is unable to keep silent on abuses of power. Some of his best-known novels include Ways of Dying (1995, MNet Book Prize); The Heart of Redness (2000, Commonwealth Writers' Prize: Africa, and Sunday Times Fiction Prize); The Madonna of Excelsior (2002, one of the Top Ten South African books published in the Decade of Democracy); The Whale Caller (2005); Cion (2007); Black Diamond (2009); The Sculptors of Mapungubwe (2013); Rachel's Blue (2014); and Little Suns (2015, Sunday Times Literary Award). Zakes Mda was born in Herschel in the Eastern Cape in 1948 and studied in South Africa, Lesotho and the United States. He wrote his first short story at the age of fifteen and has since won major South African and British literary awards for his novels and plays. His writing has been translated into twenty languages. Mda is a professor of Creative Writing at Ohio University. [Subject: Zakes Mda, Literature, Journalism, Media Studies, African Studies, Current Affairs, History, Politics, Non-Fiction]

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Page Count

278

Publisher

University of Kwazulu Natal Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1869143809

ISBN 13

9781869143800

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