The Sunday News
Kudzai Mpangi, Sunday Life Reporter
FOR most 22 year-old men, prose is just something they use to charm young ladies and show that they “got game”. But to Tapuwa “Temor” Mapaike prose is not just about words, but also a means to remedy a poverty-stricken background.
The challenges that the young optimist and skilled wordsmith has faced in his young life have been fundamental influences behind his thought provoking work.
“My work is characterised by literally the punches I have had to take on the chin and my circumstantial experiences as well as observantly studying gripping issues surrounding me. As a result, the challenges I face have actually enhanced my perspective, and acted as a fuel to drive my talents,” he said.
Mapaike has not allowed his economic predicament to stop him from pursuing his talent and dreams.
“The saddest thing in life is wasted talent. I have always believed that being a young man from a poor background with a mother who is unemployed living in the rural areas of Inyathi will not make my talent waste away. Instead I have moulded myself into becoming my own life changer,” he said.
“Writing has been a passion for me for almost eight years and thus when I completed my Advanced level and had no money to further my studies, I took my passion for writing seriously. I realised that I had to overcome these problems rather than just sitting and doing nothing,” he said
As a skilful word smith and artiste, Mapaike has used his God given talent to make ends meet and help other budding artistes pursue their dreams.
“I have so far managed to write lyrics for a couple of underground artistes in the music industry and I have also designed graphics for album covers and painted posters,” Mapaike said.
The budding artiste believes that with enough funding and support from local artistes he can turn around his life through his poetry, plays that he has been writing for the past two years, graphics design and his passion for rap music.
“As a way of advertising my works I have started approaching big names in the arts industry and I believe that my work will soon be considered seriously. I believe that my plays can be adopted for big theatre screens. Currently, I consider myself to be on the brink of solving my troubles. I will manage this through hunting for a publisher,” Mapaike said.
Despite lack of funds, Mapaike has managed to complete his debut poetry book titled After Justification which has 50 poems and will be launched in June.
