eBusiness Weekly
Bulawayo-based and controversial poet, short story writer and actor, Philani Amadeus Nyoni, has bagged two National Art Merit Awards (NAMA), namely Outstanding first creative work in 2013 for “Once A Lover Always A Fool” and Outstanding Poet in 2016. He also holds the record for “Most Shakespearean Sonnets in a Manuscript”.
Business Weekly Reporter Prince Rayanne Chidzvondo (PC), had a chat with the writer Philani Amadeus Nyoni (PAN), breaking down his creative process, motivations and background.
P.C: Why are you in writing? What other business do you do?
PAN: People think we do this because we have a choice. I do this because I’m possessed. When I’m not feeding the demon, I’m a professional Zimbabwean, but most of my life revolves around the creative economy. I’m a legion of sorts, plagued by many gifts. So that helps.
PC: Tell us a little about yourself? Who is PAN? Perhaps something not many people know?
PAN: My tongue can touch my nose. I think that’s the most fascinating thing about me. Otherwise I am just a regular guy with regular thoughts. Until the spirits announce their presence and my entire sanity revolts and my inner sight is blurred with fantastic visions and echoes of voices old and young, timeless as sunlight. My lens become a kaleidoscope colouring sand in the tones of dreams, transmuting the beggar into a king for all the things we say we own, actually enslave us and we are not ourselves without them nudging us, cautiously not to be discovered in their true shade, like society’s subtle authoritarianism.
P.C: What is your background? Education, work experience?
PAN: In my entire schooling career I came first twice: in Grade One and Upper Sixth. I think I had important things to do in between, like practising my writing. When I came first in the first grade they gave me a $30 gift voucher for a book at Meikles. My mother took me shopping one Saturday and we procured something called, “My First Book On Telling Time”. I read that book . . . All the time. That’s all the education a writer needs: literacy. If you can read and write, the rest is up to God, if you’re afflicted enough you’ll use the pen, if you need to learn you will read, like that little year-old kid who annoyed everyone by randomly announcing the time, all the time. In between both, remember to live.
PC: Can you provide me with a description of your latest books? Do you write for a specific audience?
PAN: My last book was “Philtrum 2.0”, “Philtrum” of course referring to that line between the base of the nose and the upper lip where you-know-who used to keep a moustache. The first edition, simply titled “Philtrum” was published a literal week after his eh . . . resignation. Some people thought it was a compound of my name and maybe “tantrum” and I was genuinely offended that supposed fans thought I could be so bland in naming my children. Donald got it though, but then Donald is a doctor so Donald knows anatomy.
The one before that was “Mars His Sword”. Shakespeare wrote; “Not war’s quick fire nor Mars his sword shall burn the living record of your memory”. That was an entirely braggadocious way of saying, “Look, I’m William Shakespeare, my name will survive time even if the god of war himself drew his sword and tried to Tristan it repeatedly, and now that I’ve written about you, you won’t be forgotten either”. Essentially that’s how writers get chics. At the four hundred-
year anniversary of his death I was turning twenty-six, he died at fifty two. I thought the symmetry was great, started toying with some ideas. I amped up my sonnet game and published 308. The collection of Shakespeare’s sonnets has half of that. It wasn’t anything major, you know, I just rhymed 4 312 times. I had forged the sword of Mars, and wielded the god of war’s weapon against a man who laboured to apotheosis then fulfilled his prophecy.
PC: How do the social, economic, environmental and political environments in Zimbabwe impact your work?
PAN: It’s absolutely great. The night is quiet and dark, no technology to distract my mind. I don’t watch TV but other people do, so there’s less risk of being lured by the serpentine posterior of Channel O sirens. The actual writing is fine; I write on paper anyway for most so give me a candle and I’m happy. The tension comes with the rest of the ecosystem; even I can’t afford all the books I’d like to read; I’m still saving up for yours (“Under My Skin” — Prince Rayanne Chidzvondo). International trade is painful and I can assure you that 99 percent of all writers on Amazon aren’t making anything.
There is a lot of fine print that enabled Jeff Bezos to cut his money in half at his divorce and still remain with obscene figures to spend on a new wife and lactic surgery for her to look like his old wife, but younger, if he wanted to. Never mind capitalism, our own local infrastructure is in shambles: talk of the banking system, communication. That’s what makes it difficult to show up to work everyday. I’m sure that Mzingwane/Oxford fella has a plan though, otherwise it’s going to hurt. A lot. In the posterior region.
PC: How did you get the background and skills necessary to become a writer?
PAN: Did I stutter? Read, write, repeat. And the demon.
PC: How do you market yourself?
PAN: One method is smacking street preachers dead in the mouth after they read Matthew 5:39 by then the crowd will be too intimidated to object to me reading of my own works. Once they understand that it’s a hostage situation they are very eager to part with their money in exchange for my work. It’s what the military calls a ransom not a ransom. I use this method along with any and other guerrilla methods of the Vimbai Zimuto variety.
The most effective one, though, is writing the life out of every work, line, stanza or paragraph. If the work is good on its own it finds itself in spaces you never imagined. I was telling Albert Nyathi earlier this week that someone once told me they know me because Albert had mentioned my name and style. That was in Harare, I hadn’t done much work there at the time but the big guy saw my work in my hometown and gossiped about me. Essentially people talk, you trust your friend’s opinion over whatever copywriter I can find to come up with an advertising concept. If the work is good they will gossip about it. Same goes for trash.
PC: Do you plan to publish more work or have your work translated for a larger global market?
PAN: I have been working with some lovely people by name of Karolina Jeppeson and Kristian Carlsson in translating part of my last book and some new pieces into Swedish for a collection that’s coming up pretty soon. Can you read Swedish?
PC: Where do you get your ideas? What is your writing process like? Do you view writing as a kind of spiritual practice?
PAN: Jenna is a writer, we have great conversations about the craft and what not. Last time she invited me to contemplate the Greek idea of a demon taking control and we simply being mediators. I like that; she likes the sound of it because it keeps her humble. I’m not like that, I straddle the page like Shelley’s Ozymandias and say “all glory to my awesome mind, I’m the pinnacle of millennia and evolution”, yet I’ve written long enough to respect the process, that quick metamorphosis of familiar objects into wonderful choirs of words, and the sublime seeping out, into thought yearning — nay, demanding — to be captured on paper.
Am I vain? Yes, but in my most private moments I realise that there is more to it than whatever I am. Tinashe Tafirenyika says it’s your subconscious churning and turning within. That feeds into my vanity, no, I like the daemon version better. Maybe that daemon is what Christians call the Holy Ghost. I submit that there is more than what we see out there and it moves the spirit to the mysteries of the universe. It’s like childbirth; you may know your biology, but when you hold a baby in your hands you understand that there has to be more out there.
PC: What are common traps for aspiring writers?
PAN: Thinking there’s an endgame. There isn’t; there’s no finish-line even after you’re dead.
