Ignatius Mabasa to Read Shona Poetry in San Francisco

photo by Fungai J.T.

Listen, I am too excited about this news to know where to begin, but let's start with this announcement from the organizers of the Second San Francisco International Poetry Festival:

Second San Francisco International Poetry Festival will Ring through the City in July 23-27, 2009

Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, Mayor Gavin Newsom, Jack Hirschman and the San Francisco Public Library will present the second San Francisco International Poetry Festival, July 23-27, 2009. The festival will take place at the Palace of Fine Arts and various venues and libraries throughout San Francisco.

The Festival honors our City’s great legacy of hosting and encouraging cross cultural dialogue. In 2007, the three-day extravaganza drew thousands of people from the Bay Area for free and open-to-the-public poetry and music at both large and small venues throughout the City, including a street party in North Beach, youth events, book signings, translation workshops and more.

This year’s landmark event will be co-hosted by Poet-in-Residence for Friends of the SFPL, Jack Hirschman; United States Poet Laureate Kay Ryan; California Poet Laureate Carol Muske-Dukes and the San Francisco Poet Laureate (to be named). San Francisco Poet Laureate emeritus Lawrence Ferlinghetti will be presented with a special honor.

Fifteen poets from around the world will journey to the Festival, reading together with the leaders of San Francisco’s own highly regarded literary community. The truly international group of poets, from countries including Bangladesh, China, France, Greece, Haiti, Iraq, Israel, Sudan and Zimbabwe, represent a wide spectrum in the world of poetry, from recognized masters to emerging new talents, who are redefining the art in our evolving times.

Since the 2007 Festival, Friends of the SFPL has presented smaller poetry festivals in a variety of languages, such as the Iranian Literary Arts Festival, Vietnamese Poets of the Diaspora and Flor y Canto en el Barrio: A Celebration of Latino Poetry, in their ongoing effort to continue to build cultural bridges, celebrate the literary arts and foster international dialogue

Mabasa has informed me that he will be representing Zimbabwe at this festival, which will take place only one-and-half hours from where I live. He will be in good company, especially considering that Jack Hirshman (current San Francisco poet laureate) and Kay Ryan (United States poet laureate) will be part of the festival, not to mention the poets from fourteen other countries; they all will get a chance to watch a great performance from the inventor of gospoetry.

Mabasa's presence may also be an opportunity for the Sacramento Poetry community to see this vibrant performer in action; perhaps I can ask someone to host a dual performance of Mabasa and I, like we did in the old days at UZ, in Mabvuku, in Norton...

Ignatius Mabasa is the award-winning poet and author of the novels Mapenzi and Ndafa Here. Labelled the Marechera of Shona literature by Musa Zimunya, he is also a friend of mine(I had to say this. Had to).

Check back for further details!

Comments

CARLA BADILLO CORONADO said…
Hi, Emmanuel, it´s a pleasure to find your blog. My name is Carla Badillo Coronado, and I´m one of the 15 poets invited to the next SFIFP, and I´m happy that Ignatius Mabasa also be included. I´m from Ecuador, South America and I will carry the voices of my ancestors with me, and also I will dance in the Festival (traditional dance from the Andes). Where do you live, you will be in Frisco, next July?

Abrazos from the muddle of the world,
Carla.

(I have a blog but is in spanish, couple weeks age I wrote something about my invitation to the Festival) ;)
May 3, 2009 at 8:49 AM
Emmanuel Sigauke said…
Hi Carla,

Thanks for stopping by. I live in Sacramento, which is just one and half hours away from SF, and I plan to attend since Mabasa is a great friend of mine. I also host poetry reading in Sacramento, and it would be an honor to have a poet like you come and read in Sacramento. If you can, please send me a note at manu@munyori.com so we can discuss this further.
May 3, 2009 at 8:56 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

FREEDOM, a poem on South Africa by Afzal Moolla

Freedom The shackles have been cast off. Chains broken. People once squashed, under the jackboot of Apartheid, are free. Free at last! Freedom came on the 27th day in that April, 1994. Freedom from prejudice. From institutionalised racism. From being relegated to second-class citizenship. Freedom came and we danced. We cried. We ululated as we elected our revered Mandela. President Nelson Mandela. Our very own beloved 'Madiba'. Black and white and brown and those in-between, All hues of this rainbow nation, rejoiced as we breathed in the air of freedom and democracy. Today we pause. We remember. We salute. The brave ones whose sacrifices made this day possible, on that 27th day of April, 18 years ago. Today we dance. We sing. We ululate. We cry. Tears of joy and tears of loss. Of remembrance and of forgiveness. Of reconciliation and of memories. Today we pause. We acknowledge the tasks ahead. The hungry. The naked. The destitut...
Read more

Importance of African Languages in African Literature

Once in a while, I check  the search engines terms that are driving the most traffic to my blog, Wealth of Ideas, and the searches are often revealing of what kinds of information people are looking for  at any time. Today, of the several interesting ones,  "the importance of African languages in African literature" stood out. It's a topic I too am passionate about. I have written about it before in a post entitled " Language in African Literature ", but even this doesn't begin to cover the most important facts about the issue. Perhaps one day I will write treatise on the topic of language in African literature, and mini posts like this are my way of mapping a project description. But now let's go to some serious stuff on African languages in African Literature. Let me start by saying that I am annoyed by glossaries. Their intent seems to be to appeal to a foreign audience, or, most importantly, to any speakers for whom the glossaried language is for...
Read more

Abuja Writers' Forum Call for Submissions

Wordsbody has announced the following call for submissions: CAVALCADE literary journal, devoted to publishing original stories, poems,one-act plays, reviews, critical essays and art from an African perspective,will debut in October 2008 with a special edition. The tri-annual journal, a project of the Abuja Writers' Forum (AWF), is now seeking submissions for the second and third editions. Deadline: October 30, 2008 See more details here: Contribute to Cavalcade.
Read more