About this Event
The BZS Zimbabwean Book Festival, Thursday 14 March 2024 - Day One: Face-to-Face
Siyalemukela! Mauya! Welcome!
Venue: 11 Bedford Square, Bedford College, London WC1B 3RF
Free event in partnership with Royal Holloway, University of London
Programme – Day One
12.00-14.00: Doors open - networking
14.00-14.15: Welcome and Introductions
Dr Knox Chitiyo, President, Britain Zimbabwe Society; Senior Associate Fellow, Chatham House; writer
Professor Tim Unwin CMG, Royal Holloway University; author & editor
14.15-15.30: Panel 1 Introducing New and Established Diasporan Writers and Publishers
Speaker 1: Brian Chikwava, author, musician
Speaker 2: Speaker 2: Godess Bvukutwa, Mambakwedza Women's Centre, Global Voices Scholar,University of East Anglia, editor, author
Speaker 3: Sheka Tarawalie, former Sierra Leone Deputy Communications Minister, journalist & novelist
Chair: Professor Tim Unwin
15.30-16.30: Keynote Session
Speaker: Rutendo Mutsamwira, Cultural Attache, Dzimbanhete Arts and Cultural Interactions
Chair: Dr Knox Chitiyo
16.30-17.30: Panel 2 New Frontiers in Zimbabwean and African Writing
Speaker 1: Rudo Manyere, book reviewer, author & booktuber
Speaker 2: Masimba Musodza, CEO Fairfield Media, novelist
Speaker 3: tba
Chair: Dr Rhoda Molife, pharmaceutical Physician and Medical Oncologist, writer, publisher, editor
17.30-18.30: Networking/Close
For further information please contact
Programme & speakers: Knox Chitiyo <[email protected]>
Promotion & registration: Margaret Ling <[email protected]>
Participants in our BZS Book Festival Day One Face-to-Face event are also invited to join our Day Two online event on Saturday 16 March 2024. Register on Eventbrite at
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-bzs-2024-zimbabwean-book-festival-day-two-i-write-therefore-i-am-tickets-787520102827
The BZS 2024 Zimbabwean Book Festival: I Write, Therefore I Am
Thursday 14 (in-person) and Saturday 16 March (online) 2024
Siyalemukela! Mauya! Welcome!
The Britain Zimbabwe Society is hosting its second Zimbabwean Book Festival on Thursday 14 March and Saturday 16 March 2024. Following the success of the first BZS Book Festival in March 2023, the 2024 Festival will again be a forum for interaction with novelists, short story writers, poets, dramatists, publishers, academics and creatives.
The two day Festival will be held face-to-face on Thursday 14 March, and online on Saturday 16 March. It will be a convivial space for discussion, ideas, storytelling, celebration and sharing of in-country and diasporan Zimbabwean and African writing, and an opportunity to see and hear new voices alongside established talent.
This free event is an opportunity for everyone to be part of a creative indaba and dare. From fiction to non-fiction; realism and magic realism; oral and written story-telling; detective stories, sci-fi and comic books; arts and crafts; the panoramas of language and languages; and the real-world craft and business of writing and publishing - all this and more will be explored.
Held shortly after the 2024 World Book Day on 7 March, and dovetailing with the 2024 London Book Fair (12-14 March), the Festival reminds us that books, reading and writing are an essential part of what it means to be human. We celebrate the extraordinary array of talent in Zimbabwean and African writing, publishing, and imagination. We are honoured to play our part in promoting and encouraging creativity.
Join us and help shape contemporary and future Zimbabwean and African wordscapes. Feel lifted. Write. Speak. Breathe. Books and writing are for all, and everyone has a story. We write, therefore we are. At the 2024 BZS Zimbabwean Book Festival, The Story is YOU.
Photos (from top)
© Feije Riemersma|Dreamstime.com
© AmaBooks
© Aleksandar Mijatovic|Dreamstime.com
© AmaBooks
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
11 Bedford Square, Bedford College, London, United Kingdom
GBP 0.00