The bond between a mother and a daughter is strong and it is through these bonds that the strengths and history of a woman’s family are passed down. Zenzele is the story of a mother who, when faced with the reality that her daughter is gone to Harvard, writes a letter explaining all that she could not explain while Zenzele was growing up. It is a story with two purposes, to teach about the strengths and beauties of Africa and it’s traditions but also to show how crucial the bond between mother and daughter are in creating an identity and passing one on. 

The book is short but critical in exploring the ways in which both individuals and a culture deal with the post-partum like difficulties of establishing themselves outside of colonialism The mother- Amai Zenzele- discusses all that happened in her life that led to where she was as a mother and where she hopes these memories will direct her daughter. 

Throughout the books she begins a new chapter or thought by bringing up something her daughter has asked her growing up that Amai Zenzele struggled to answer at the time, but now struggles to answer in terms of her experiences growing through the revolution in Rhodesia- now Zimbabwe. You can see in the writing how the author’s character seems to develop even for herself a better understanding of who she is and what her identity is as an African and as a woman- things she wants her own daughter to understand and discover. 

Identity- whether it be gender, familial, or racial- is the greatest theme in this book. Amai Zenzele touches the hearts of both mothers and daughters of any race as the subjects reach beyond Africa and touch the desires of every mother- to show their daughter the strengths they possess as women. 

Amai Zenzele reminds me much of my own mother. She is a hard working woman with little contribution to any of the great struggles of her time. She seems to view her contributions- housewife, mother, companion to her activist husband- at times as less than those of other women and less than those she knows her daughter will achieve later in life. This misconception adds a note of desperation to her letter, as though she is begging her daughter not to discount her words simply because they are the words of a housewife and lowly mother. She uses the lessons she has learned from those around her- her sisters, women they were friends with who fought and risked their very lives trying to free their country. 

The story is exciting and as you read it you find yourself hoping that Zenzele, too, reads and feels the pounding excitement in her blood that you feel hearing and reading of the strives made by those she grew up around. That she feels the burning pride of her mother and a pride of her own to be associated with such strong and brave people. It is something that perhaps many Africans would do well to associate with- this strength and pride in their people to come together and overthrow oppressive government. After all, isn’t that how countries such as the United States were formed? And our pride as Americans is seated deep within us- we’ve had 250 years to establish that as a proud part of our identity.  

Zenzele is an authors attempt to encourage Africans to take pride in their roots, to remember where they came from and be proud of it. It is a plea from one woman to all her children and siblings, the “many seeds from one fruit” to be proud of their history and their heritage and to make it a cornerstone of their identity- to make it a cornerstone of the identity of their people.