“THE SHAPING OF WATER” Writing the novel – the origins of the book.

“THE SHAPING OF WATER”

Writing the novel – the origins of the book.

My father took me to see the Lake Kariba dam wall being built when I was sixteen.

That is quite another story.

I first saw the lake in 1972 when my husband went to work for the North Bank Construction Company and we lived there for a year. Once we were settled in Lusaka, the lake became our favourite weekend retreat. It was beautiful, strange, dangerous, vast and mysterious. A human experiment with the environment on a scale that was difficult to comprehend.

This painting made by me in the late 70's or early 80's tried to capture my conflict about the lake and its destruction of the environment. The girl holds a stone and a stick. The lake has reduced the earth and the forest of the valley to its elements. She stands on the shore full of doubt and wonder.

It is too simplistic to condemn the builders of the lake and the dam but the questions remain to be asked even if it appears there are no easy answers. My novel is a story not a argument for or against but perhaps it will be thought-provoking.

For anyone concerned about the proposed Batoka Dam – ask the questions and keep asking. The environment will and must change but how and why, how much and for whom?