Richard Bartlett
I started learning Portuguese after reading the short stories of Luis Bernardo Honwana in “We Killed Mangy Dog”, which at the time was the only fiction from Mozambique available in English.
I then completed an MA in Southern African Literature and translated a number of African authors who write in Portuguese, including Ungulani ba ka Khosa, Lilia Momple, Pepetela, and Ondjaki.
I grew up in Zimbabwe and South Africa in the 1970s and 80s and was drawn to the egalitarian ideals of Mozambique at a time when race determined fate in South Africa. My exploration of Mozambique’s fictional landscape led me to put together “Short Stories from Mozambique”, published in 1995.
I have worked as a financial journalist in Johannesburg and London, and now I work in corporate communications in the Middle East and continue to translate whenever I can, with a focus on Lusophone African fiction.