The Sunday News
Raisedon Baya
THE first two months of 2019 have been hectic, heart-breaking to say the least. We lost a giant in music, the colossal and towering figure of Oliver Mtukudzi. Then a few weeks later another giant, this time in the literary world also fell. Charles Mungoshi, whose creative genius saw him pen over 17 books and was a giant in his own right, was laid to rest only last week.
This past week another giant, Bulawayo-born and South Africa-based legend Dorothy Masuka was called to help angels sing in Heaven. What a loss. Three big libraries of art and culture burnt down to ashes. The sector continues to mourn.
When Tuku died and was immediately declared a national hero no one questioned the decision. It was a first. The arts sector was so happy that a precedent has been set and that for the first time someone who was not a war hero and politician had been accorded national hero status. We were all appreciative of the decision.
However, when Charles Mungoshi took his last breath the sector had huge expectations — who could blame them? A request was dispatched to the powers that be for Mungoshi to be declared a hero.
Unfortunately, this time it was not to be and one of the greatest literary minds to come out of this country was buried in silence in his home village in Chivi. He was buried like any other ordinary person.
The deaths, coming after each other quickly, have shown us the need to create a hall of fame for artistes. A hall of fame is not a burial place. Neither is it a shrine. It won’t be like the National Heroes Acre too. A hall of fame will not be for dead artistes only. It will be a place for those individual talents who excelled and are outstanding in their different artistic fields.
This could be the place where the sector immortalises its own heroes. The beauty of this idea is that it will honour and celebrate both the living and the departed.
The hall of fame will be like the sector’s own national heroes acres — without graves, huge monuments and a lot of politics. It could either be a virtual space or a physical one. In the physical space we could commission statues in honour of our creative heroes, have samples of their work, things they treasured and their short bios on the walls.
The selection of these heroes will be left to peers in the arts sector. There will be little bureaucracy and politicking. We foresee the hall of fame housing the likes of Tuku, Mungoshi, James Chimombe, Safirio Madzikatire, Dambudzo Marechera, Don Gumbo, Chiwoniso Maraire, Andy Brown, Cde Chinx, Mthandazo Ndema Ngwenya, N S Sigogo, Yvonne Vera, Mackay Tickeys. The list could go on and on.
The hall of fame will definitely put artistes and the sector in charge of honouring their own heroes.
The idea of the hall of fame has been tried elsewhere and with great results. It won’t be the first time it is tried. Even here in Zimbabwe we know the theatre sector, through Zimbabwe Theatre Association, once mooted the idea of a virtual hall of fame for theatre artistes.
We remember Josh Nyapimbi and Stephen Chifunyise working on the idea. Unfortunately, we are not sure what happened to that project. But as a sector we need to start serious conversations around the issues of honouring our creative heroes the best way possible. We are the creatives, and the ideas should come from us. As a sector we should not wait for politicians to make decisions for us, we should lead and do things for ourselves.
On a different note recently we went to the theatre to watch a play called Zandezi by Cedrick Msongelwa and Ronald Sgeca. The title of the show didn’t mean a thing to us. So we went there wondering what dish the two young men had cooked. And oh boy were we wonderfully surprised?
The play is a beautiful fusion of many genres, though anchored in physical theatre. It is fresh, masterly put together and was well acted by the two actors. Watching it we were suddenly reminded of the day we sat and witnessed Cont Mhlanga’s Dabulap launch at Stanley Hall years back.
Zandezi also brought memories of watching Mbongeni Ngema’s Asinamali at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, South Africa. This play has started the theatre season in Bulawayo at such a high note, that other artistes have no choice but to up their game.
