Prolific Zimbabwean Writer Charles Mungoshi DiesProlific Zimbabwean writer Charles Mungoshi died Saturday in Harare. In a statement, the late Mungoshi’s family said Zimbabwe had lost a great novelist, father and poet. “It is with deep sadness that we announce the passing away of our dearly beloved father, Dr. Charles Mungoshi (71). He had been ill for ten years, from a neurological condition to which he succumbed this morning at Parirenyatwa Hospital. “We were honoured to have Dr. Mungoshi, a quiet, deeply loving and caring husband to Jesesi, father to Farai, Graham, Nyasha, Charles and Tsitsi and a grandfather to seven young and lovely grandchildren. He was a prolific and multi-award winning novelist, poet, short story writer, actor who was internationally recognized and celebrated.” According to the family, Dr. Mungoshi, will be laid to rest in Chivhu (Manyene, Marundamashanu Farms) on Tuesday. His body will lie in state at his home Sunday, and then to Chivhu on Monday. We are grateful for the outpouring of support and love we have received from all Dr. Mungoshi’s friends and colleagues across the world. He published 18 books, which include Waiting for the Rain (1975), Ndiko Kupindana Kwemazuva (1975), Makunun’unu Maodza Moyo (1970),The Milkman Doesn’t Only Deliver Milk (1981), Inongova Njake Njake(1980), Coming of the Dry Season (1972), Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness (2013). Among other accolades, Dr. Mungoshi twice won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize of Best Book in Africa and was subsequently invited to meet the Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth. One of his poems was curetted by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as a permanent display as a piece of public art at their new headquarters in Seattle, Washington, in U.S in 2011. In 2003, he was conferred an honorary doctorate degree by the University of Zimbabwe after winning multiple awards which include Zimbabwe’s 75 best books where he appeared in the top five lists in both Shona and English categories.