To start with...

Events can take away people and possessions but, as long as they have reasonable control of their faculties and given access to even just pen and paper, a person can write. Circumstances have transported me from my homeland of Zimbabwe to my home in the Scottish Borders, via South Africa, and throughout my travels and settled phases I have been writing. My experiences form the backdrop for my novel called "Ruth" which has given me scope to remember Africa. It has not yet been published but you can read extracts on this website. (see novels page...)

I began my working life by using typewriters and carbon paper. I went to universities in South Africa and gained a Bachelor of Journalism degree from Rhodes University, Grahamstown and a BA Hons (English) from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. I then worked for national English-language daily newspapers (see my Autobiographical Sketch) at a time when Apartheid was entrenched. Understanding that I was just a cog in the wheels of institutionalised racism, I left. I became even more aware of my guilt-by-association when I came across to Britain. This was in 1976, in the days before Britain fully realized its own race problems.

Usually, people’s immediate response on meeting me is political so I will try and summarize my stance. I learned through my parents to be a white liberal. They and I never voted for the Rhodesian prime minister who in 1965 declared unilateral independence from Britain. We were among a small White minority who did not support Ian Smith or his efforts to thwart Black majority rule. I don’t believe in group discrimination of any sort and I strive for tolerance. I am not a racist but, at the same time, I wouldn’t presume to understand how Black nationalists feel about my kind. I have been in Britain now for longer than I lived in Southern Africa and still hold very dear my childhood spent under the African sun.   continue » »