Elieshi Lema

Ecrivain tanzanienne.

Elieshi Lema, born 1949, is a Tanzanian writer and cultural figure.



Lema grew up in the village Nronga on Kilimanjaro’s slopes. Metropolitan Life, she faced when she began her university studies to study to become a librarian. She also holds a master’s degree in creative writing. Her writing, first poetry and then children’s books began while she was working in a Tanzanian publisher. Now she has many years own publishing, E & D Vision Publishing Limited. E & D publishes textbooks, children’s books, and fiction and also has a book café adjacent to the publisher.



 Lema’s children books are written in Swahili, but her first novel for adults, Parched Earth (2001), she wrote in English in Swedish it was published by Tranan2004 entitled Burnt earth, in Roy Isakson translation. It is a story of love between mother and daughter, sister and brother, and between man and woman. Infatuation obsession depicted with a sensuality that never occurred before in Tanzanian literature, which was not without controversy in the country. The book portrays life between traditional and modern norms, patriarchal oppression of women but also the men who do not fit the usual expectations and a young woman’s path to the realization that she must take control of their lives.