Kasala for My Kaku
By Fiston Mwanza Mujila
Translated by J. Bret Maney
A new poetic form from Fiston Mwanza Mujila, lauded author of novels Tram 83 and The Villain's Dance and poetry collection The River in the Belly.
Publication Date: October 28, 2025
Paperback: 9781646054114
eBook: 9781646054121
Description
The Slaughterhouse of Dreams is rooted in a traditional Congolese form of praise poem that ties together proverbs, myths, fables, and riddles into a recitation, accompanied by music. In Mwanza Mujila’s skilled hands, this oral tradition becomes a new multimedia form, kasala, set to the page while retaining the remarkable drama, emotion, and celebration of its performed root. In The Slaughterhouse of Dreams, multiple lyrical traditions create a hybrid world of different global spaces and layers of time. Within this world, everything is possible, real and surreal at the same time. With the rhythmic, frenetic energy found in his poetry, prose, and performances, Fiston Mwanza Mujila reanimates and simultaneously deconstructs ideas of the (post)colonial environment.
Biographical Information
Fiston Mwanza Mujila was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1981 and lives today in Austria. His debut novel, Tram 83, won the German International Literature Award and was longlisted for the International Man Booker and the Prix du Monde. His second novel, The Villain’s Dance, was a finalist for the National Book Award for Translated Literature. In addition to The River in the Belly, he is the author of the poetry collections Craquelures (2011) and Soleil privé de mazout (2016), and three plays, Et les moustiques sont des fruits à pépins, Te voir dressé sur tes deux pattes ne fait que mettre de l'huile sur le feu (2015) and Zu der Zeit der Königinmutter (2018). His writing responds to political turbulence in his native country and frequently foregrounds its debt to jazz.
J. Bret Maney is a literary critic and translator from French and Spanish. He is a recipient of several awards, including the 2020 Gulf Coast Translation Prize for his translations of Fiston Mwanza Mujila’s poetry and an International Latino Book Award and PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant for his translation of Guillermo Cotto-Thorner’s novel, Manhattan Tropics (Arte Público, 2019), which he also co-edited. He is Assistant Professor of English at Lehman College, City University of New York.
Reviews
“In a state of turmoil, water—mayi!—gushes from its source. It springs up in beautifully unpredictable spurts. Over which only the earth has final say. So it is with the poetry of Fiston Mwanza Mujila. So it is with the minerals scratched from the ground. Whether in Kolwezi, Kipushi or Tenke-Fungurume, in this land saturated with cobalt, uranium and other things no less terrible, and which we end up jettisoning abroad at the border post of Kasumbalesa, in the region where the author of these sublime verses was born.” —In Koli Jean Bofane, author of Congo Inc.
“The Slaughterhouse of Dreams in translation opens up a traditional African poetic performance to the world with charm and acuity. But make no mistake: it’s a poetic river deep in history, longing, family, anger, love, and a quest for a nation within the self, layer by layer.” —Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún, author of Eṣù at the Library and co-editor of Best Literary Translations