MAISHA YETU
When Ngugi wa Thiong’o was in the country for the launch of his latest book Dreams in a Time of War: A Childhood Memoir, yours truly had a chance to talk with him, and the interview touched on a number of issues. Among other issues he urged young writers not to shy away from self-publishing […]
Ever since I heard that Kenya’s government spokesman Alfred Mutua has written a book on, wait for it, How to be rich in Africa, I knew something was amiss somewhere. With all due respect Mutua was the last person I expected to write on such a topic. He must have hustled his way to a […]
After months of deliberation, the judging panel of the Wahome Mutahi Literary Awards have announced the list of nominees for the 2010 edition. Maishayetu hereby gives you the list of nominees in both the English and Kiswahili categories. English 1. Hawecha: A Woman for all Time by Rhodia Mann – Sasa Sema/Longhorn 2. A Measure […]
The Annual Nairobi International Book Fair, now in its 13th edition is set to take place from September 22 to 26, at the Sarit Centre in Nairobi. Maishayetu spoke to Mr Lawrence Njagi, the chairman of the Book Fair on what is in store for book lovers. Mr Njagi is also the managing director of […]
No Kenyan publisher has ever taken Moraa Gitaa seriously. And while they have generally given her manuscripts a wide berth, Penguin Books, one of the world’s most respected publishers, thinks otherwise. Out of the 250 manuscripts received all over Africa for the inaugural Penguin Prize for Africa Writing, Moraa’s and five others became the eventual […]
As a little boy growing up in Limuru, writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o was, one night, woken up by his mother to meet some ‘visitors’. Young Ngugi was pleasantly surprised to find that one of the visitors was his elder brother Wallace Mwangi, also known as good Wallace. Years back, Good Wallace had escaped to the […]
News that Judith Akinyi could have gone back to her old drugs trade did not exactly catch me by surprise. Although I did not interact with her on a one-on-one basis, after she was released from jail, I nevertheless saw her on many occasions during literary events when she was in the process of promoting […]
Good people, I came across this email, written by Prof Chris Wanjala, and posted in the Pen Kenya google group, and I thought it was interesting. Though Prof Wanjala shies away from comparing Mochama with Zimbabwe’s Dambudzo Marechera, I would be more incline to compared Mochama, aka Smitta with Dambuzo. Read on… Dear Juba, Taban […]
I decided to retrieve the following comment from the comments section, which is in response to the on going debate on Harare North. I felt that it the merits a post on its own. The author is Prof Maurice Amutabi, who teaches History at Central Washington University in the US. Share your thoughts on the […]
Hi there, Yesterday I blogged about Marimba Media, the new Pan African arts journalist platform, which, to all you art lovers, promises to be an exciting forum where you can interact with cutting edge arts reporting from some of the best arts journalists across the continent. While I pointed you to the review I did […]