Why Scholastique Mukasonga Is My Favorite Rwandan Writer

Of all the Rwandan writers alive today, Scholastique Mukasonga is perhaps my favorite. I’ve read most of her books and have always been fascinated by the originality of her writing and her ability to describe complex Rwandan culture and customs so eloquently.

Reading Mukasonga transports me back to my mother’s world: women lovingly preparing ikigage sorghum beer, the fermentation in clay pots (ikibindi), the rhythmic sound of grinding stones (urusyo) pulverizing grain.

Her words bring back a vanishing Rwanda, one that, for most genocide survivors, ended in 1994, when our loved ones and a million other Tutsis were massacred. She honors folklore at risk of fading away.

In her memoirs “The Barefoot Woman” and “Cockroaches” (my two personal favorites), Mukasonga vividly shows what daily life looked like for the Tutsis who were deported from various districts of Gikongoro to the harsh forests of Bugesera in the 1960s.

Forced to live alongside wild predators like leopards and lions, this exiled community endured a tragic period in Rwanda’s history that I, born years later in the 1980s, only came to understand through her firsthand account. No one has ever described this painful episode of the past so poignantly.

Through her poetic voice, reclaiming lost myths and matrilineal wisdom, Mukasonga makes sure the resilience of exiled Tutsis lives on. That’s why I’m thrilled to share this fantastic review published today in the London Review of Books by Kevin Okoth, on her gift for storytelling.

Top Mukasonga Books & Summaries

1. Inyenzi or Cockroaches (2006) – Memoir depicting Mukasonga’s experiences growing up as a young Tutsi girl in southwest Rwanda, recounting rising ethnic tensions, anti-Tutsi discrimination, and violence that forced her family into exile.
2. The Barefoot Woman (2008) – Second memoir paying tribute to the author’s mother and other resilient women in the Tutsi refugee camps, documenting their daily struggles and efforts to maintain cultural traditions.
3. Our Lady of the Nile (2012) – Debut novel fictionalizing Mukasonga’s time at an elite Catholic girls school, weaving personal student dramas with mounting ethnic conflicts erupting outside school gates on the eve of an uprising.
4. Igifu (2016) – a poignant short story about a five-year-old girl named Colomba struggling with hunger that gnaws at her belly like a “dizzying hole.” In a desperate act of preservation, Colomba’s mother gathers enough sorghum to whip up a nourishing porridge, bringing her daughter back to life.
5. Kibogo (2022) – Novel exploring Rwandan ancestral folklore through the story of the mythic figure Kibogo interwoven with tales of a village battling colonial interference in traditional beliefs blamed for a devastating drought.

I recommend all of them. They keep alive Rwandan stories that mainstream histories often leave out. Ends.

By Albert Gasake