The Shirburnian Catastrophe

written by Basil Diki

As a polygamous Sherburne-educated ruler, a Scottish music aficionado, drools over Mimudeh, a sixteen-year old drum-major in a bagpipe school band, a prophecy given by a royal oracle haunts him. When the schoolgirl’s father, an Opposition MP, moves a controversial motion, the child vanishes. Her parents consult the same oracle, which triggers a cyclone as politics, brutality and sexual perversion intersect. The diviner seems to disclose that the schoolgirl is already deflowered. The fiasco ropes in army generals and Mimudeh’s heartthrob, Archer McLeod, and everyone is sucked into the eye of the cyclone. Knife-edge drama that pits absurd realities against popular ideals takes centre-stage, rudely offering Archer a lifetime opportunity. But is a move at the end a brainy manoeuvre, a romantic act or a divine solution to a complex equation? The Shirburnian Catastrophe is a contemporary play in two parts; Squaring A Circle (Book I) and Square Circle In A Triangle (Book II). This volume contains both books.

Basil Diki

Basil Diki, born in Kadoma, Zimbabwe in 1971, is an iconic prolific dramatist who has written, performed and directed numerous plays. In 1988 he pioneered the founding of Rimuka Performing Arts, a theatre company, and in 1991 founded Kadoma Actors and Writers Organisation. He has won several awards for his daring and outstanding dramaturge, notably the 2001 Writing & Publishing Award, Special Mention; Poetry and Drama from the Zimbabwe Book Publishers Association for the play The Tribe of Graves. In 2004 he won the Best Achievement & Production Award from the Zimbabwe Invitational Drama Festival Society for directing his play Behind the Façade. He is an entrepreneur and a freelance Total Quality Management practitioner. Father to a son and two daughters, he still leaves in the City of Kadoma as a celebrated thespian, drama critic and adjudicator.