"I write at night but I think about it all the time. I
like to have the theme and the characters inside me for a
while. So far it hasn't hurt. And of course, I'm always
observing. I always work like that. I feel the pressure
build up, up, up in my head, then I just let it
explode." 1
"There is still a sense of self-realization in many of my
stories. There is a quest within the story of the writer
trying to find answers within the story or the novel, trying
to understand. I never know how my stories are going to end,
so even when I'm writing I'm wondering what's going to
happen. And partly the question is, What am I going to
discover about myself?" 2
BIOGRAPHY
M. G. Vassanji is not an author who is easily labelled. He
is of South Asian descent and was born in Nairobi, Kenya
where he lived until the death of his father. His family
then moved to the community of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Vassanji left Dar es Salaam in 1970 to study at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, investing many years
in his career as a physicist. In 1978 he came to Canada and
began work at the Chalk River power station. Two years later
he became a research associate and lecturer at the
University of Toronto. He was reluctant to take his passion
for writing as a serious career alternative until he
published his first novel, The Gunny Sack, in 1989
and won the 1990 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for best first
book in the African region.
Vassanji's novels and short stories draw on his experiences
and sense of community and are peopled with the old and
young, traditional and modern, and the assimilated and
displaced. Thematically, his fiction attempts to connect the
past and the present, assimilate traditional and
contemporary values, and balance a sense of community with
an individual's struggle to belong.
Vassanji is the founder of the Toronto South Asian Review, a
nonprofit organization that supports South Asian Canadian
writers. He is the editor of their journal, The Toronto
Review of Contemporary Writing Abroad (formerly The
Toronto South Asian Review) and contributes his short
stories to anthologies and other collections on behalf of
the organization.
WORKS BY M. G. VASSANJI
- The gunny sack . -- Oxford : Heinemann International,
1989. -- 276 p. --
ISBN 0-435-90544-9
- No new land . -- Toronto : McClelland & Stewart, 1994,
c1991. -- 208 p. --
ISBN 0-7710-8720-9
- Uhuru street . -- Toronto : McClelland & Stewart,
1992. -- 144 p. --
ISBN 0-7710-8717-9
- Book of secrets . -- Toronto : McClelland & Stewart,
1994. -- 337 p. --
ISBN 0-7710-8719-5
WORKS IN PARTICIPATION WITH THE TORONTO SOUTH ASIAN REVIEW
(TSAR)
- The Toronto South Asian review . -- Edited by M. G.
Vassanji. -- Vol. 1, no. 1 (Summer 1982)-Vol. 11, no. 3
(Spring 1993). -- Toronto : Toronto South Asian Review, 1982-
1993. -- Continued as The Toronto review of contemporary
writing abroad. --
ISSN 0714-3508
- "A matter of detail". -- The Asianadian. -- Vol. 4,
no. 4 (December 1982). -- Submitted as editor of the
Toronto South Asian review . -- ISSN 0705-8861. -- P. 3-
6
- A meeting of streams : South Asian Canadian
literature . -- Edited by M. G. Vassanji. -- Toronto :
TSAR Publications, 1985. -- 145 p. -- Vassanji also
contributed an essay to this collection: "The post colonial
writer : myth maker and folk historian". --
ISBN 0-920661-00-
9
- "In the quiet of the afternoon". -- The Journey Prize
anthology : the best short fiction from Canada's literary
journals . -- Toronto : McClelland & Stewart, 1989. --
Submitted by the Toronto South Asian review . -- ISBN
0-7710-4430-5 -- P. 38-48
- The geography of voice : Canadian literature of the South
Asian Diaspora. -- Edited by Diane McGifford. -- Toronto
: TSAR Publications, 1992. -- 274 p. -- Includes excerpts from
No new land . -- ISBN 0-920-661-27-0
- The Toronto review of contemporary writing abroad . --
Edited by M. G. Vassanji. -- Vol. 12, no. 1 (Summer 1993)-
. -- Toronto : Toronto South Asian Review, 1993- . --
Formerly The Toronto South Asian review . -- ISSN 1200-
0043
WORKS ABOUT M.G. VASSANJI
- Kirchhoff, H. G. -- "Figuring that words are the way to go".
-- Globe and mail (Toronto). -- May 4, 1991. -- P. E2
- Smith, Stephen. -- "Stories not yet told". -- Books in
Canada . -- Vol. 21, no. 5 (Summer 1992). -- ISSN 0045-
2564. -- P. 26-29
- Ball, John Clement. -- "Interview with M. G. Vassanji". --
Photographs by Sam Kanga. -- Paragraph : the Canadian
fiction review . -- Vol. 15, nos. 3 & 4 (Winter 1993-
Spring 1994). -- ISSN 0838-9624. -- P. 3-8
Notes
1 Quoted by H.G. Kirchhoff, "Figuring that words are the way to go", Globe & Mail (Toronto), May 4, 1991, p. E2.
2 Quoted by Stephen Smith, "Stories not yet told", Books in Canada, Vol. 21, no. 5 (Summer 1992), p. 29.
