| ISBN | 9789996066771 |
| Pages | 192 |
| Dimensions | 210 x 148mm |
| Published | 2021 |
| Publisher | Luviri Press, Malawi |
| Format | Paperback |
Of Life, Love and Death
Collected Short Stories
by Steve Chimombo
Innovative, interesting, out of the ordinary, are accolades used to describe the stories in Of Life, Love and Death. They grew out the turbulent years of Malawi's third republic, through the years beyond to the second and into the third and reflect the times, places, and concerns of the people at all times. Some were molded, if not mutilated, by the oppressive political climate Malawi experienced in the thirty years of Banda's first republic between 1964 and 1994. Some of them could not have been conceived and written during that period without reprisals from the all-powerful Censorship Board, which dictated what could or could not be published. Others were written, but denied publication until the more democratic era after 1994.
Review
"This edition is coming at the time of a completely different pandemic, COVID-19, which the late Steve Chimombo has been fortunate to miss. Yet the stories remain entirely relevant, especially those about death related to HIV&AIDS. Just as the characters suffering from HIV&AIDS were stigmatized, so now again we are witnessing the stigmatization of people suffering from COVID-19. Just as during the height of the AIDS pandemic, before the advent of anti-retroviral therapies (ARVs), fake news and fake treatments or even cures proliferated, so now we are seeing a repeat of the same issues. Some of these issues were not mentioned in the original introduction, even though addressed in certain stories, such as gender-based violence and child abuse, but they are proliferating during the current pandemic too. Truly, good literature remains timeless in its relevance."