18 Facts About Dambudzo Marechera

Dambudzo Marechera was a Zimbabwean novelist, short story writer, playwright, and poet.

Dambudzo Marechera was the child of Shona parents from the eastern-central part of Rhodesia.

Dambudzo Marechera grew up amid racial discrimination, poverty, and violence.

At the University of Oxford, Dambudzo Marechera struck his professors as a very intelligent but rather anarchic student who had no particular interest in adhering to course syllabi, choosing rather to read whatever struck his fancy.

Dambudzo Marechera had a reputation for being a quarrelsome young man who did not hesitate to fight his antagonists physically, especially in the pubs around Oxford.

Dambudzo Marechera began to display erratic behaviour, which the school psychologist diagnosed as schizophrenia.

Dambudzo Marechera threatened to murder certain people and attempted to set the university on fire.

For trying to set the college on fire, Dambudzo Marechera was given two options: either to submit to a psychiatric examination or be sent down; he chose the latter, charging that they were mentally raping him.

At this point, Dambudzo Marechera's life became troubled, even landing him in Cardiff Prison in 1977 for possession of marijuana, and a decision regarding his deportation.

Dambudzo Marechera joined the rootless communities around Oxford and other places, sleeping in friends' sitting-rooms and writing various fictional and poetic pieces on park benches and being regularly mugged by thugs and harassed by the police for vagrancy.

Dambudzo Marechera was the first and the only African to have won the award in its 33 years, and he became a celebrity in the literary circles of England.

At the buffet dinner for the award of the Guardian Fiction Prize, in a tantrum Dambudzo Marechera began to launch plates at a chandelier.

Dambudzo Marechera thought the British publishing establishment was ripping him off, so he resorted to raiding the Heinemann offices at odd times to ask for his royalties.

Friends, fellow Zimbabwean students such as poet Musaemura Zimunya, Rino Zhuwarara, writer Stanley Nyamfukudza, and mere casual friends were all suspected by Dambudzo Marechera of being involved in his many troubles even when they acted in good faith.

Dambudzo Marechera was regularly thrown out of the Africa Centre, the cultural meeting-place in London's Covent Garden for African and Afrocentric scholars and students.

Some accounts suggest that Dambudzo Marechera married a British woman but not much is known about the union.

Dambudzo Marechera returned to the newly independent Zimbabwe in 1982 to assist in shooting the film of The House of Hunger.

Dambudzo Marechera's poetry was published posthumously under the title Cemetery of Mind.