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Southern Mozambique, 1894. Sergeant Germano de Melo is posted to
the village of Nkokolani to oversee the Portuguese conquest of
territory claimed by Ngungunyane, the last of the leaders of the
state of Gaza, the second-largest empire led by an African.
Ngungunyane has raised an army to resist colonial rule and with his
warriors is slowly approaching the border village. Desperate for
help, Germano enlists Imani, a fifteen-year-old girl, to act as his
interpreter. She belongs to the VaChopi tribe, one of the few who
dared side with the Portuguese. But while one of her brothers
fights for the Crown of Portugal, the other has chosen the African
emperor. Standing astride two kingdoms, Imani is drawn to Germano,
just as he is drawn to her. But she knows that in a country haunted
by violence, the only way out for a woman is to go unnoticed, as if
made of shadows or ashes. Alternating between the voices of Imani
and Germano, Mia Couto's Woman of the Ashes combines vivid
folkloric prose with extensive historical research to give a spell
binding and unsettling account of war-torn Mozambique at the end of
the nineteenth century.
Mozambique, 1895. The last days of the so-called Gaza Empire. After
an attack on his quarters, defeated sergeant Germano de Melo is
taken by his bright, young love Imani to the only hospital within
reach an arduous river journey. Meanwhile, war rages all around:
Emperor Ngugunyane's warriors fight the Portuguese occupiers with
swords and spears, until the arrival of the machine gun ensures
European domination.
Set against the backdrop of the war between the Kingdom of Gaza,
one of the last great pre-colonial African kingdoms, and the
Portuguese colonialists, a young African woman Imani and the
Portuguese sergeant Germano de Melo have shared an unexpected love.
While Germano is left behind in Africa, serving with the Portuguese
military, Imani is enlisted to serve as interpreter to the
imprisoned emperor of Gaza, Ngungunyane, on the long voyage to
Lisbon. For Ngungunyane and his seven wives, it will be a journey
of no return. Whereas Imani will come back only after a decade-long
odyssey through the Portuguese empire at the turn of the nineteenth
century. In the third novel of his acclaimed Sands of the Emperor
trilogy, Couto supplies a voice to those silenced by the horrors of
colonialism. As he depicts the beauty and terror of war and love,
and reveals the devastation of a profoundly unequal clash of
cultures, he gives a uniquely personal voice to a little-known
period of history.
An NPR Best Book of 2021 New and selected fiction, over half in
English for the first time, from the winner of the 2014 Neustadt
Prize. Known internationally for his novels, Neustadt Prize-winner
Mia Couto first became famous for his short stories. Sea Loves Me
includes sixty-four of his best, thirty-six of which appear in
English for the first time. Covering the entire arc of Couto's
career, this collection displays the Mozambican author's
inventiveness, sensitivity, and social range with greater richness
than any previous collection-from early stories that reflect the
harshness of life under Portuguese colonialism; to magical tales of
rural Africa; to contemporary fables of the fluidity of race and
gender, environmental disaster, and the clash between the
countryside and the city. The title novella, long acclaimed as one
of Couto's best works but never before available in English, caps
this collection with the lyrical story of a search for a lost
father that leads unexpectedly to love.
At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Gaza province of
Mozambique is drowning in a torrent of war. Imani, a
fifteen-year-old girl, struggles with her cultural identity as she
is torn between her VaChopi roots and the occupying Portuguese. Her
life becomes further fractured as her family is broken apart amid
the conflict. Germano, a sergeant wrestling with guilt and
grandeur, attempts to subdue one of the last African kingdoms, but
meanwhile falls in love with Imani and loses himself to an
infectious madness. In this vivid and enchanting novel, Mia Couto
masterfully interweaves history with folklore and has managed to
create a work of rare originality and imagination.
Mariano, who has lived in the city from an early age, is summoned
back to his village to attend his grandfather's funeral. But when
he arrives, he discovers two things: firstly, that he has been
nominated by his grandfather to take over the running of the family
affairs, secondly that his grandfather has not died completely, but
is in that frontier space between life and death. In traditional
belief, he has died 'badly', and something must happen in order for
him to be laid to rest. Mariano starts to receive letters
supposedly written by his grandfather, telling him about the
family. It is through this strange relationship that he discovers
the secret of his own birth, while also cleansing his grandfather's
conscience. The novel contains a blend of picturesque and sometimes
comic characters and situations.
A police inspector is investigating a strange murder, a case in
which all the suspects are eager to claim responsibility for the
act. Set in a former Portuguese fort which stored slaves and ivory,
Under the Frangipani combines fable and allegory, dreams and myths
with an earthy humour. The dead meet the living, language is
invented, reality is constantly changing. In a story which is
partly a thriller, partly an exploration of language itself, Mia
Couto surprises and delights, and shows just why he is one of the
most important African writers of today.
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The Drinker of Horizons
Mia Couto; Translated by David Brookshaw
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R483
R415
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An old man and a young boy, refugees from a civil war, seek shelter
in a burnt out bus. Among the effects of a dead passenger, they
discover a set of notebooks that tell of his life. As the boy reads
the story to his elderly companion, the tale gradually becomes part
of their own lives. Sleepwalking Land, Mia Couto?s first novel, was
an immediate success, and judged at the Zimbabwe Bookfair 2001 to
be one of the 12 best African books of the 20th century. Set in the
author?s native Mozambique, the novel examines the effects of war
and devastation on a newly independent African nation. A sombre
book, it reflects a moment in the history of Mozambique when the
country could only go forward after settling its account with the
bloody past. Deftly exploring the relationship between oral
tradition and the written word, truth and fiction, memory and
invention, this is a memorable book that captures a critical moment
in Africa?s history.
Eye on Africa: Thirty years of Africa images, selected by Salgado
himself Sebasti?o Salgado is one the most respected
photojournalists working today, his reputation forged by decades of
dedication and powerful black and white images of dispossessed and
distressed people taken in places where most wouldn?t dare to go.
Although he has photographed throughout South America and around
the globe, his work most heavily concentrates on Africa, where he
has shot more than 40 reportage works over a period of 30 years.
From the Dinka tribes in Sudan and the Himba in Namibia to gorillas
and volcanoes in the lakes region to displaced peoples throughout
the continent, Salgado shows us all facets of African life today.
Whether he's documenting refugees or vast landscapes, Salgado knows
exactly how to grab the essence of a moment so that when one sees
his images one is involuntarily drawn into them. His images
artfully teach us the disastrous effects of war, poverty, disease,
and hostile climatic conditions. This book brings together
Salgado's photos of Africa in three parts. The first concentrates
on the southern part of the continent (Mozambique, Malawi, Angola,
Zimbabwe, South Africa, Namibia), the second on the Great Lakes
region (Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya), and the
third on the Sub-Saharan region (Burkina Faso, Mali, Sudan,
Somalia, Chad, Mauritania, Senegal, Ethiopia). Texts are provided
by renowned Mozambique novelist Mia Couto, who describes how
today's Africa reflects the effects of colonization as well as the
consequences of economic, social, and environmental crises. This
stunning book is not only a sweeping document of Africa but an
homage to the continent's history, people, and natural phenomena.
Shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award 2017 A
finalist for the 2015 Man Booker International Prize My sister
Silencia was the most recent victim of the lions, which have been
tormenting our village for some weeks now... When Mariamar Mpepe's
sister is killed by lions, her father imprisons her at home. With
only the ghost of her sister for company, she dreams of escape, and
of the hunter who abandoned her years before. I'm the last of the
hunters. And this is my last hunt. Archangel Bullseye, born into a
long line of marksmen, is summoned back to Kulumani. But as he
tracks the lions in the surrounding wilderness, his suspicions grow
- that the darkest threats lie not outside the village, but at its
very heart. What was happening was what always happened: The lions
were coming back... Set in a forgotten corner of East Africa
haunted by superstition, tradition and the shades of civil war,
this is a struggle that blurs the savagery of nature, and the
savagery of man.
A RADIO FRANCE-CULTURE/TELERAMA BEST WORK OF FICTION
BY THE WINNER OF THE 2013 CAMOES PRIZE
AND THE WINNER OF THE 2014 NEUSTADT PRIZE
"Quite unlike anything else I have read from Africa.""--Doris
Lessing
"By meshing the richness of African beliefs . . . into the Western
framework of the novel, he creates a mysterious and surreal
epic."--Henning Mankell
Mwanito was eleven when he saw a woman for the first time, and the
sight so surprised him he burst into tears.
Mwanito has been living in a former big-game park for eight years.
The only people he knows are his father, his brother, an uncle, and
a servant. He's been told that the rest of the world is dead, that
all roads are sad, that they wait for an apology from God. In the
place his father calls Jezoosalem, Mwanito has been told that
crying and praying are the same thing. Both, it seems, are
forbidden.
The eighth novel by the internationally bestselling Mia Couto, "The
Tuner of Silences" is the story of Mwanito's struggle to
reconstruct a family history that his father is unable to discuss.
With the young woman's arrival in Jezoosalem, however, the silence
of the past quickly breaks down, and both his father's story and
the world are heard once more.
"The Tuner of Silences" has been published to acclaim in more than
half a dozen countries. Now in its first English translation, this
story of an African boy's quest for the truth endures as a magical,
humanizing confrontation between one child and the legacy of war.
PRAISE FOR MIA COUTO
"On almost every page ... we sense Couto's delight in those places
where language slips officialdom's asphyxiating grasp."--"The New
York Times"
"Even in translation, his prose is suffused with striking
images."--"The Washington Post"
PRAISE FOR DAVID BROOKSHAW
"David Brookshaw dexterously renders the novel's often colloquial,
pithy Portuguese into lively English. Brookshaw's task is made more
exacting by the particular quality of Couto's brilliance."--"The
New York Times"
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