Sign and Taboo: Perspectives on the Poetic Fiction of Yvonne VeraRobert Muponde, Mandivavarira Maodzwa-Taruvinga Yvonne Vera's Nehanda (1993) signalled the presence of a new and remarkable writer. Four subsequent novels have confirmed that she was the most important African novelist to emerge during the 1990s. Critics from Zimbabwe, South Africa, Britain, the Caribbean and the United States demonstrate through a diversity of theoretical approaches the originality of her work. Yvonne Vera's dense and poetic writing records public and private experiences of moments in Zimbabwe's history through the consciousness of her central women characters. What sets her apart from most authors is her ability to handle the most difficult subjects and confront taboos. North America: African Books Collective; Zimbabwe: Weaver Press |
Contents
Language voice and presence in Under the Tongue | 3 |
writing the voice in Under the Tongue | 15 |
signs of Yvonne Veras world | 25 |
Copyright | |
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African Literature ancestors becomes birth body Bulawayo Butterfly Burning calabash chapter characters Chenjerai Hove child colonial consciousness construction context create cultural death discourse dream escape experience female freedom Fumbatha gender Grandmother Harare healing House of Hunger ibid identity imagination incest journey Kaguvi Kezi kwela land language liberation linked living Makokoba Matabeleland Mazvita mbira meaning memory metaphor metonymy mother movement Muroyiwa myth Name narrative narrator nation nationalist Ndebele Nehanda Nonceba Nyenyedzi orality orature past patriarchal perspective Phephelaphi photograph political post-colonial pre-colonial present rain rape reader reality relationship representation represents resistance ritual river role Runyararo says Second Chimurenga sense settlers sexuality Shona Sibaso silence social space speech spirit possession story stranger structure struggle symbolic Tongue township traditional transformation University Vera's fiction Vera's novels vision voice woman women words writing Yvonne Vera Yvonne Vera's ZANLA Zhizha Zimbabwe Zimbabwe Open University Zimbabwean