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Vera to be greatly missed
Wonder Guchu, The Herald (Zimbabwe)
April 13, 2005

http://www.herald.co.zw/index.php?id=42458&pubdate=2005-04-13

WHEN Yvonne Vera first came to the Zimbabwe International Book Fair in 1992, she was 28 and had written two books Why Don’t You Carve Other Animals and Nehanda.

Having spent much of her life studying in Canada, Vera was a stranger to most of us but somehow her approachability and easy-going nature endeared her to the people with whom she mingled during those early days.

Learned as she was, Vera never showed it to most of us who were still struggling to have our work accepted by a publisher. She had time to listen and discuss without pushing her opinions.

When she eventually returned home, settled in Bulawayo and had Under the Tongue published, I had an opportunity of reviewing the book for the Sunday Mail.

In the review, I raised concern over the poetic language that I felt the ordinary reader would not understand. I also made reference to her earlier book, Nehanda, which I described as a book infested with crawling insects.

Later in the same year, I met her during a function at the German Embassy where she was presenting a paper on literature. We had met before, engaged in discussions but when we met then, she took me to task over what I meant.

After exchanging ideas, she said that she was relieved that there were reviewers who see things their own way on behalf of their readers.

According to her, the majority of Zimbabwean reviewers were concerned with glorifying even badly written literary works.

Constructive criticism, I recall her saying, helps even those who have written tens of books.

That was the last time I saw her in person after reading about a misunderstanding she had had with the organisers of the ZIBF.

Vera vowed that she would never have anything to do with ZIBF after that misunderstanding. I believe she never attended the fair until her death last week in Canada.

Such was Yvonne Vera’s principles and this is also what the reader gets when reading her books.

Writing not as a woman but a writer with a conscience, Vera’s stories are about the injustices with which the society treats women and girl children.

This is what runs through the short story collection Why Don’t You Carve Other Animals to Stone Virgins.

It’s the same when she writes about an unbalanced relationship in which the man adopts a holier than thou attitude or when it’s about a small girl whose father abuses her sexually and suffers in silence.

One also finds this when Vera deals with issues of making the hardest of decisions that only pleased the individual or when she deals with history as in Stone Virgins.

Stuck at the centre of all this are women and this was not because Vera was a woman but because she felt strongly about issues that affected this neglected section of the society.

This too was part of her principles.

She was born in Bulawayo on 19 September 1964 in the then Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).

After secondary school in Zimbabwe, Vera relocated to Canada where she studied at York University, Toronto where she obtained a BA Hons. in English, a Master of Arts in English and a Doctorate in English.

In 1992 she published her short story anthology, Why Don’t You Carve Other Animals, Nehanda came in 1993 and in 1994, she wrote Without a Name. Another great book, Under the Tongue, was published in 1997 and it won the Commonwealth Award for the Africa Region.

She also wrote the award winning Butterfly Burning and Stone Virgins.

In July 1997, Vera was appointed regional director of the National Gallery of Zimbabwe in Bulawayo where she lived until she left for Canada last year.

Her death diminishes us.

May her Dear Soul Rest In Peace.

Meanwhile, the first memorial service for Dr Vera will be held at St John’s Anglican Cathedral in Bulawayo on 23 April and another one is set for Harare during the Zimbabwe International Book Fair in August.

The National Arts Council of Zimbabwe has described Dr Vera, the NAMA Award winner, as a beacon of inspiration and a role model for all literature lovers.

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