Shimmer Chinodya was born in a township (black ghetto) in Gweru, in the Midlands area of Zimbabwe (Gwelo, Rhodesia at the time). He spent the first eight years of his life there; then – in 1965, the year Rhodesia's Prime Minister Ian Smith declared unilaterally independence from Britain – his parents built a second home in a village in the north-west of the country. Chinodya's mother made her home there with his sisters, his father remained in town, and Chinodya and his brothers alternated between the two and boarding school. In 1976, at the height of guerrilla struggle for majority rule, Chinodya was a boarding student at Goromonzi, an elite government high school for Africans near the capital. (He edited and contributed to the school magazine there; his first publication was a…

1179 words

Citation: Primorac, Ranka. "Shimmer Chinodya". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 21 March 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=863, accessed 12 October 2024.]

863 Shimmer Chinodya 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

Save this article

Leave Feedback

The Literary Encyclopedia is a living community of scholars. We welcome comments which will help us improve.