Journalism influences my career as an author: Nyarota
AWARD-WINNING journalist and media consultant, Geoffrey Nyarota, last week launched his third book titled The Honourable Minister, An Anatomy of Endemic Corruption at Royal Harare Golf Club. Nyarota is recognised mostly for his work as an investigative journalist.
His new book follows Against the Grain: Memoirs of a Zimbabwean Newsman published in 2006 and The Graceless Fall of Robert Mugabe in 2018.
NewsDay Life & Style senior reporter Winstone Antonio (ND) caught up with Nyarota (GN), who shared some insights of his latest book.
ND: You have just launched your third
book, to what extent would you say your journalism experience has influenced your books?
GN: My work as a journalist over many years has duly influenced the development of my career as an author over the past two decades.
This goes back to 2003 when I started writing my first title, Against the Grain. My writing style is influenced by my writing experience as a journalist.
More significantly, the content that I have packed into my three titles comprises my personal experiences and those more significant matters that I have encountered as an investigative journalist over the years.
Above all, the fact that I have worked many years as a newspaper editor means I have learnt to skilfully discipline my writing. This is crucial in handling the massive text that goes into the manuscript of a book.”
ND: Given that your last book was published in 2018, were you giving yourself time to dig into the issues raised in the book?
GN: It is now four years since I finished writing the manuscript of The Graceless Fall of Robert Mugabe.
That is quite clearly a long stretch for a determined author to craft a manuscript of the length such as that of The Honourable Minister.
In fact, I regard this book as the outcome of hyper-activity on my part during the
COVID-19 lockdown era. Because of the enforced limitation on movement, I had time to research, to be creative as well as to package the vast array of fascinating and provocative issues that I raise in the narrative.
ND: Concerns have been raised in certain circles, for instance, that The Graceless Fall of Mugabe scratched the surface of what actually transpired during the November 2017 coup which toppled the late former President Robert Mugabe and just rehashed what was already in the public domain. What is your comment?
GN: That could be true to some extent, but that does not necessarily entail any weakness of the narrative. I was commissioned to write about the downfall of former Mugabe back in 2017.
In fact, I would be better placed to do justice to this question if I had an inkling of the identity of the “certain circles” that have raised the concerns that you refer to.
Let me start by explaining the circumstances in which the Graceless Fall was conceived. A fortnight after the fall of Mugabe, I was approached by Penguin Books. They pride themselves as “publisher of great writers and gifted storytellers, beloved books and eminent works.
Penguin had recently acquired Zebra Press of Cape Town, South Africa, publishers of my first literary work, Against the Grain in 2006, which I crafted while in the United States.
“Penguin had a specific commission for me. It was to produce a manuscript on the downfall of Mugabe and to do so within a certain period of time. They particularly wanted mine to be the first book to be published on the downfall of Mugabe.
They gave me a twomonth deadline. There were obvious challenges attendant to this assignment. I accepted the challenge and submitted the requested manuscript two weeks after the deadline, accompanied by the catchy headline, The Graceless Fall of
Robert Mugabe, in line with my theory that if was First Lady Grace Mugabe, who ultimately caused the downfall of her aged husband.