Description
Poetry. African & African American Studies. This is an origin tale, a reclamation of memory, a movement towards wholeness in thought that helps shape action and inform deed. These poems are an anchor cast out from the graveyard in the Atlantic ocean tethering the beginning of the myth of me in North America to a place.
"Ayodele's poetry is a combo of her MFA training and her Lower Bottom Playaz socialization. One must be aware she is a dramatist as well; thus, her style reflects our oral tradition, especially in the rawness and truthfulness of her writing as an extension of the Black Arts Movement."—Marvin X
"THE HORSE EATERS is a masterful blending of a resilience blueprint, wisdom for the poetic journey into justice, and artfully divine inspiration. How does one negotiate life when given the tools of negativity but the inner spirit houses an abundance of gifted determination? Dr. Nzinga writes, 'If you have a bulldozer; you can wait for opportunity. If you have a teaspoon; you must learn to make it.' THE HORSE EATERS beautifully displays the notions of searching for freedom inside of a given storm, and pulls no punches in regard to the harshness of the traverse. But, it also delivers a roadmap, lined with prophetic clarity, on how to survive a systemic trampling. The words are not simply to be read. They are to be ingested and worn upon the heart."—Regina Evans
"Adodele Nzinga clings to metaphors with the same force that forms diamonds out of sand. Not letting them go until their value is apparent. Her plain-spoken flow is bereft of pretension, yet clearly a linguistic gift. In the eponymous essay which opens THE HORSE EATERS, Nzinga holds truth close to her heart, and it explodes onto the page like a bomb-or better yet, a balm, salving at a centuries-old wound which can only be healed by understanding, compassion, and the manifestation of racial equity. She abstracts her expression in the prose poems which follow, each one ringed with emotional resonance and resilience born out of her ancestors' struggles—as well as her own lived experience."—Eric Arnold
"Ayodele Nzinga has arrived as a poet of heroic strength and authority. Ayodele sows word seeds and clears an upward path through concrete and bulldozers, armed with only a teaspoon of hunger and determination to give voice and testament to the powerful spirit of her people in the on-going struggle for freedom."—Genny Lim
Author Bio
Ayodele Nzinga is the founding producing director of the Lower Bottom Playaz, Inc. Founded in 1999, they are Oakland's oldest North American Theater Company, currently in the 21st Season of continuous production. Described as a renaissance woman, Nzinga is considered a multi-disciplined creative force—she is a producing director, playwright, poet, dramaturg, actress, performance consultant, educator, and community advocate. She is the founder of Lower Bottom Playaz Summer Theater Day Camp. She is the Founding Director of the Black Arts Movement Business District Community Development Corporation, Oakland, (BAMBD CDC) and Founding Producer of BAMBDFEST. Nzinga holds an MFA in Writing and Consciousness, and a PhD in Transformative Learning. Her work includes SORROWLAND ORACLE (Nomadic Press, 2020), THE HORSE EATERS (nomadic Press, 2017), A Narrative Inquiry into Performance Pedagogy, work in Vision Magazine, two volumes of the Journal of Pan African Studies, 14 Hills Journal, Magnolia Journal, and in the anthologies Environmental Terrorist and Say it Loud. Stage productions include Mama at Twilight: Death by Love, Mack: A Gangsta's Tale, Lifer, and Beyond the Bars: Growing Home. Film credits include The Everlasting Coconut Tree, So Beautiful, Protection Shields, Cleanse, The Story of a King, and Tent City produced by 393 Film. Nzinga is credited with directing the longest-running African American play in North America, One Day in the Life, and is the only director to produce a fully-staged play in the iconic African American Museum and Library at Oakland, CA. Nzinga is a Cal- Shakes Artist Investigator Alumni, the founding Artistic Director of the original Recovery Theater, a Helen Crocker Russell Arts Leadership Fellow, and a member of the Alameda County Women's Hall of Fame. Nzinga is recognized by Theater Bay Area as one of the 40 faces in the Bay Area that changed the face of theater.
Author City: OAKLAND, CA USA