-
Get a Free Issue
of our Ezine!
Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
How to pronounce NoViolet Bulawayo: Elizabeth Zandile Tshele is pronounced approximately zan-dal-shull. Her pen name, NoViolet Bulawayo, is pronounced as it looks
NoViolet Mhka Bulawayo is the pen name of Elizabeth Zandile Tshele
Bulawayo was born in 1981 and raised in the Tsholotsho District, Zimbabwe. She attended Njube High School and later Mzilikazi High School for her A levels.
Bulawayo completed her college education in the US, studying at Kalamazoo Valley Community College, and earning bachelor's and master's degrees in English from Texas A&M University-Commerce and Southern Methodist University respectively. In 2010, NoViolet earned her MFA at Cornell University where she was a recipient of the Truman Capote Fellowship, and most recently, a lecturer of English. She is now a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University.
In 2011 Bulawayo won the Caine Prize for African Writing for her short story Hitting Budapest about a gang of street children in a Zimbabwean shantytown. Her novel entitled We Need New Names was released in 2013, and was named on the Man Booker Prize 2013 longlist.
NoViolet Bulawayo's website
This bio was last updated on 08/27/2017. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.
Do you have a writing community, ie, other Zimbabwean or African writers you interact with or you find the place isolating and if so is this isolation good or bad?
I'm in an MFA program so yes, I have a writing community. I have no interaction with Zimbabwean and African writers on a workshop level, so on that basis, I am "isolated." It's a double-edged sword—In the past I would crave that specific common ground that would come with interacting with writers from my own background, and that happened when I felt like my mates didn't "get" what I was trying to do. I'm over that now, not having that common ground means I have to forge a new one, and for me that is humanity. It means I have to stand on another level, to go beyond "Zimbabwean-ness" and "African-ness" in my writing, that space without the "burdens" of identity. Actually I've come to appreciate it as liberating, so I guess I can confidently say, it's good, very good, even though it took me a while to get here.
What is your inspiration and does that influence what you write about? Any favourate writers?
Humanity. "Womanity." My homeland. As for writers I'd say Yvonne Vera inspires me more than any other writer because I care ...
Uwem Akpan was born in Ikot Akpan Eda in southern Nigeria. After studying philosophy and English at Creighton and Gonzaga universities, he studied theology for three years at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa. He was ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
We Need New Names
Try:
Say You're One of Them
by Uwem Akpan
Monica Ali is the daughter of English and Bangladeshi parents.
She came to England at the age of three, and her first home was Bolton in Greater Manchester. Ali later studied at Oxford University.
Her first novel, Brick ...
(more)
If you enjoyed:
We Need New Names
Try:
Brick Lane
by Monica Ali
We recommend 12 similar authors
Libby Lost and Found
by Stephanie Booth
Libby Lost and Found is a book for people who don't know who they are without the books they love.
There is no worse robber than a bad book.
Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!
.png)
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
