Aubrey Paton Interviews We Are All Zimbabweans Now Author James Kilgore

by Emily on Sep 28th, 2009

James Kilgore first made news in South Africa when he was arrested in Cape Town in 2002. He had been living under the alias Dr. John Pape and become a respected academic at the University of Cape Town. U.S. authorities extradited him to California where he served six and a half years in prison. He was released 10 May 2009. (See Remembering James Kilgore in Cape Town.)

Kilgore grew up in California and lived in the volatile San Francisco Bay Area during the late 60s and early 70s. He became immersed in left-wing politics, eventually linking up with the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA). His involvement with the SLA led to an indictment for possession of explosives in 1975. Kilgore then fled the law for 27 years, living in Zimbabwe, Australia and South Africa. He abandoned the politics violence, focusing on a career as an educator. He resided in Harare, the site of his novel, We Are All Zimbabweans Now, from 1982-91. There he met his wife, Terri and also wrote a doctoral dissertation on the history of domestic workers in Zimbabwe.

Here’s the first print interview with the author to appear since the book’s release, conducted by the Sunday Times‘ Aubrey Paton:

Q: You were a revolutionary, an academic fugitive, a prisoner and, finally, a published author: did you ever dream you would have such an eventful life?

A: When I was a child, I dreamed of becoming a famous baseball or basketball player. Obviously those dreams didn’t quite pan out. Dream of becoming a writer? Never. If I even had even a faint inkling of a future as a writer, it would have been as a sports journalist.

Q: The main character, Ben Dabney, is naive, politically blinkered and idealistic: how much of your youthful self do you see in him?

A: There’s a certain naiveté in all political activism, a certain naive belief in the ability that your actions can change the world, regardless of the odds. I had that naiveté, still have some of it. But my naiveté was very different to Ben’s. I was an activist, a person of action. He was a scholar, a person of reflection. And I never believed in Mugabe the way Ben did, though I also never dreamed Mugabe could descend to his current depths.

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