Kumukanda

£10.00

Kayombo Chingonyi

A writer of power and precision, as striking on the page as he is on the stage, this is Kayo Chingonyi’s much-anticipated first collection. In poems that are at once assured and incisive, he eloquently confronts issues of race, self-portraiture and self-perception to shine a light on all that is dark, hidden, ‘smuggled from polite conversation’.

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SKU: 9781784741396 Category: Tag:

Description

*Winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize 2018*
*Winner of the Somerset Maugham Award 2018*

‘A brilliant debut – a tender, nostalgic and, at times, darkly hilarious exploration of black boyhood, masculinity and grief. A gorgeous and necessary collection from one of my favourite writers’ Warsan Shire

Translating as ‘initiation’, kumukanda is the name given to the rites a young boy from the Luvale tribe must pass through before he is considered a man. The poems of Kayo Chingonyi’s remarkable debut explore this passage: between two worlds, ancestral and contemporary; between the living and the dead; between the gulf of who he is and how he is perceived.

Underpinned by a love of music, language and literature, here is a powerful exploration of race, identity and masculinity, celebrating what it means to be British and not British, all at once.

*Shortlisted for the Costa Poetry Prize; Seamus Heaney Centre First Poetry Collection Prize; Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry; Roehampton Poetry Prize; Jhalak Prize 2018*

Additional information

Weight 74 g
Dimensions 21.6 × 13.5 × 0.4 cm
Author

Publisher

Chatto & Windus

Imprint

Cover

Paperback

Pages

52

Language

English

Edition
Dewey

821.92 (edition:23)

Readership

General – Trade / Code: K