Zakes+Mda

Zakes Mda is a famous South African novelist, poet, and playwright. Legally, his name is Zanemvula Kizito Gatyeni Mda. He was born in Herschel, South Africa, in 1948. Mda has worked and studied in South Africa, Lesotho, and the United Kingdom. In South Africa and the United Kingdom, he has taught English and creative writing. Recently though, Mda has come to the United States and is an English professor at Ohio University. He has also been a visiting professor at Yale and the University of Vermont. He was a founding member of African Writers Trust. This is a non-profit organization intended to bring African writers together to share ideas, skills, and other resources. Zakes Mda was awarded an honorary doctorate of the University of Cape Town on June 8, 2012. This was for his contributions to world literature.

Zakes Mda’s novels have been translated in twenty-one languages. Some famous works include //Ways of Dying//, //The Heart of Redness, The Madonna of Excelsior//, and //The Whale Caller//. //The Madonna of Excelsior// was selected as one of the Top Ten South African Books published in the Decade of Democracy. His first piece came out in 1977, and the most recent in 2014.