About Dambudzo Marechera
Dambudzo Marechera was a Zimbabwean novelist, short story writer, playwright, and poet. His short career produced a book of stories, two novels, a book of plays, prose, and poetry, and a collection of poetry. His first book, a fiction collection entitled The House of Hunger (1978), won the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1979. Marechera was best known for his abrasive, heavily detailed, and self-aware writing, which was considered a new frontier in African literature, and his unorthodox behaviour at the universities from which he was expelled despite excelling in his studies. Marechera's first book and magnum opus, The House of Hunger (1978) – a collection of one novella and nine satellite short stories – came immediately after his largely disappointing time at New College, Oxford. Marechera was the first and the only African to have won the award in its 33 years, and he became a celebrity in the literary circles of England. The House of Hunger was awarded the 1979 Guardian Fiction Prize.
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