Frank Thabani Sayi and Peter Godwin

Open University lecturer and former police officer Frank Thabani Sayi and author, journalist and former human rights lawyer Peter Godwin discuss the country of their birth, Zimbabwe, and why they write about it, including themes of colonialism, ethnic violence, racial equality, migration and legacy.

Sayi grew up in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, in the 1970s and later came to England on a scholarship. He was raised in a native reserve under white colonial rule where repression was rife. In No Safer Kinder Hatred: How Racial Hatred and Ethnic Violence Shaped Zimbabwe he writes about his family and the impact of war. He highlights the human capacity for extraordinary violence but also for compassion, endurance and survival.

Godwin is a foreign correspondent and documentary maker and author of non-fiction books including Mukiwa, winner of the George Orwell Prize, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun: A Memoir of Africa, winner of the Borders Original Voices Award, and The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe. In his most recent book, Exit Wounds: A Story of Love, Loss and Occasional Wars, he reflects on his early life in Zimbabwe, including his time as a conscript in the Rhodesian army, and on conflict in Africa.