By KPC
Barbara Kimenye (1929-2012), East Africa’s best-selling children’s author of all time, would be 95 years old today.
Kimenye’s Moses series that centre on the times of mischievous schoolboys, Moses Kibaya (alias Holy Moses) and Sebastian Mulutu (King Kong), at the fictional Mukiibi’s Educational Institute for the Sons of African Gentlemen are somewhat a staple of primary and secondary school literature curriculums throughout Anglophone Africa.
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Kimenye was born Barbara Clarke Holdsworth in West Yorkshire, England on 19th December 1929.
She had her early education in the UK, and she was in London training as a nurse when she met and fell in love with Bill Kimenye, a son of a chief from Bukoba, Tanzania, who, at that time, was also a student in London.
The two got married and moved together to Tanzania in the mid 1950s.
When the titanic in their marriage hit the iceberg, Kimenye left Tanzania for Uganda.
She had already borne Bill one child before the bell of separation tolled and was heavy with their second son.
In Uganda, Kimenye took a job as Kabaka Edward Muteesa’s private secretary.
Her house was within the precincts of Twekobe, the Kabaka’s official palace in Mengo, and from her window, she made use of her prying eyes on Muteesa’s stormy marriage with Nnaabagereka Damali Kisosonkole, and would later spill their marital woes on page.
Whereas Kimenye was herself rumoured to have had an affair with the rather polyamorous Muteesa, her non-fiction work often eluded the subject.
In 1965, Kimenye quit the royal duties at Mengo and settled in Kenya.
She would for the rest of her life throw her weight on writing with such prolificacy that she brought forth over 50 titles, and remains (up to date) the most acclaimed children’s author in East African literature.
Although she was a British of Jewish-Indian parentage, Kimenye considered herself a Ugandan, and, indeed, her work delineates the local Ugandan people and places with precision, detail and colour.
At the time of her death in 2012, Kimenye had returned and settled in London.
Editor’s note: This article has been circulating online for a while, with attribution to one Ian Muddu. We have published it in memory of Barbra, whose contribution to literacy through her books cannot be gainsaid. Accompanying photos were sourced from the Internet.
