In The Sunday Times (Blantyre) Temwani Mgunda profiles Aubrey Kachingwe: One among literary greats -- "famed for being the first Malawian writer to publish with the prestigious African Writers Series. The celebrated writer published a political novel, No Easy Task, in 1966 just four years after African Writers Series was launched"
Almost half a century later:
Almost half a century later:
Ironically, Kachingwe confesses he does not remember the story in his novel. Born in 1926, the literary giant is now old and frail such that it is, surely, not an easy task for him to call to mind what he wrote decades ago but what he says he cannot forget is that "the story is political in a subtle way".No Easy Task was actually published by Heinemann in hardback before it was published in paperback as part of the AWS series -- and now I feel a bit guilty about having a copy of that first edition .....
Another surprise is that currently the author does not have even a single copy of the novel and he discloses that each time he acquires one it immediately gets stolen.