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15 Nov 2006 11:26:51
Legendary Malawian poet, Jack Mapanje, who was imprisoned in his home country during the 1980s for his political verses, will be giving a free reading of his work at the University of Bedfordshire next Thursday (23 November).
Students at the University are already familiar with his work as it forms part of the African literature module on the English Studies degree programme. Members of the public are also invited along to hear his great works at the Polhill campus.
Michael Faherty, Senior English Studies Lecturer, said: “We are really looking forward to Jack’s recital and we are honoured to have such a celebrated poet at the University. We are particularly pleased that he will run a workshop for our students earlier in the day.
“We really hope the local community takes advantage of this opportunity to enjoy an evening with this wonderful poet who has led such an extraordinary life. Everyone is welcome.”
Mapanje grew up in a newly-independent Malawi under the dictatorship of Hastings Banda. In 1975, Mapanje became a lecturer in English at Chancellor College, which is part of the University of Malawi.
He became an early member of the now famous Malawi Writers’ Group that formed at the college, and published his first collection of poems in London Of Chameleons and Gods, in 1981.
Although it was banned in schools and colleges throughout Malawi and sold in just one bookshop, the book quickly became very well known. The oblique political criticism of its poems was eventually brought to Banda’s attention and Mapanje was arrested in 1987. He was held at Mikuyu Prison by the Malawian Government, without trial or charge, for more than three-and-a-half years.
Human rights activists and writers, Noam Chomsky and Harold Pinter, were among the campaigners who gathered outside the Malawi High Commission in London, to protest at his arrest and read poems from the banned volume.
In prison, Mapanje was deprived of pen and paper, but he continued to write and record new poems in his head, resorting to an oral style of composition that has been a characteristic of his work ever since.
Following his release in 1991, Mapanje and his family settled in Britain, where he published two more volumes of verse, The Chattering Wagtails of Mikuyu Prison (1993) and Skipping Without Ropes (1998), as well as The Last of the Sweet Bananas: New and Selected Poems (2004). He has also edited collections of oral poetry from Africa and is currently working on his own prison memoirs.
Mapanje was poet in residence at The Wordsworth Trust in Grasmere and now teaches memoir writing and poetry masterclasses at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne.
The reading will be held at the University’s Polhill campus, in Polhill Avenue, on November 23 and gets under way at 7.30pm.
Latest news» 2006» Nov» Community invited to see legendary Malawian poet
