ON Tuesday evening NoViolet Bulawayo finally came home. The young talented writer making headlines all over the world with her writing finally stood before her own people — former classmates, friends and family — and read from her new book We Need New Names.
The Bulawayo launch was the second launch of her book — the first having been held in Harare — but it was still the biggest in terms of attendance.
Tuesday’s launch could possibly be one of the most attended book launches in Bulawayo. For Intwasa Arts Festival KoBulawayo, one of the supporters of the event, it was a good pre–festival event.
While the attendance was quite good — in fact, it was more than good — it was NoViolet Bulawayo’s words about the role her father played in cultivating the storyteller in her that touched most people’s hearts.
While thanking her father NoViolet acknowledged the importance of the stories she had been told as a child. Some of the stories probably shaped her love for stories, if not the writing of stories.
Indirectly, Noviolet seemed to acknowledge the importance of stories in children’s lives, a fact the festival agrees with 110%.
Year by year the festival tries to cater for the needs of young people, especially the school-going age. Meeting the needs of the young audiences has now become a norm for the festival and a visible priority in programming the festival’s events.
This year for young audiences, festival goers will witness an introduction of a traditional heritage of storytelling to the now popular Live Literature Project as well as the Plan High Schools Drama Competition.
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Dubbed Kolobeja — Stories from a Zimbabwean Childhood — the presentation is a variety of mesmerising tales inherited from our grandmothers and brought to life by the Schools Playwrights and Actors Academy (SPAA) of Nhimbe Trust as well as the renowned community theatre group Bambelela Arts Ensemble.
While the presentations are targeting pre and primary schoolchildren they are also suitable for all age groups especially for those families who want to relieve the art of storytelling and trigger those old memories when we used to sit by the bonfire at night and our grandmothers kept us awake with beautifully crafted tales well into the middle of the night.
The definition of proper theatre for children is when we have theatre being performed by children for children. Children play a core role in creating stories as well as presenting them to their peers and adults.
Kolobeja – Stories from a Zimbabwean Childhood by SPAA is one production that can best be described as child-centred and a must-see for the whole family.
It has young people getting into the shoes of our grandmothers and astonishingly narrating the beautiful stories with the eloquence and clarity of elders.
The tone, tempo and twists of the stories will startle the always eager young ones and keep the elderly on the edge of their seats.
Sharing the stage with SPAA will be Bambelela Arts Ensemble a tried and tested community theatre group that has survived through the years when most community theatre groups have collapsed or switched over to dance which has a bigger and ready market.
Bambelela Arts Ensemble has stuck to their identity of community theatre and one of the arts genrés that they have pursued with some excellence is story telling. They will present the story Khulu Dollar.
The cast consist of seasoned artistes, some of them natural comedians and others master orators in their own right.
The fusion of narration, dramatisation and song in communication adds value to the presentation. For the elder students the festival is offering setbook dramatisation in the form of A Doll’s House, Song of Lawino and The Lion and The Jewel.
These are “O” and “A” Level Literature in English setbooks. Raisedon Baya is the director of Intwasa Festival KoBulawayo
