In this powerful memoir, Nega Mezlekia recalls in vivid detail his boyhood in the arid city of Jijiga, Ethiopia, and his coming of age in the 1970s and 1980s, his country's most turbulent period. 
In a narrative that sparkles with wit, Mezlekia traces his own personal journey from boy to man. We meet Wondwossen, his best friend and collaborator in mischief; Mr. Alula, their embattled teacher; Mr.Tadesse, full-time school director and part-time poacher; Mustafa, the unconventional Muslim boarder; Mrs. Yetaferu, the Orthodox Christian boarder who manages to find a saint to worship each day of the year and thus successfully avoids gainful employment; and Yeneta, the local priest who is privy to the languages of heaven and hell. Mezlekia describes the difficulties that consumed Ethiopia after the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie and the rise to power of the communist Junta whose merciless Red Terror slaughtered 100,000 Ethiopian youths. Though Mezlekia was forced, at the tender age of eighteen, to join a guerrilla army, and had several brushes with death at the hands of reactionary exorcists, he somehow escaped the bloodbath. Notes from the Hyena's Belly teems with the smells, sights, and sounds of life in the Horn of Africa - of its violent, ingenious humans and its underworld of screeching monkeys, lions and hyenas. Part autobiography, part social history, and wholly captivating, this is an unforgettable portrait of a world where the boundaries of credulity are challenged daily. Out of this rich, sundrenched land where modern corruption rides ancient custom like a hungry bird of prey, Mezlekia crafts a world elegant in its aridity, extreme in its absurdity, and vast in its ironies.

Notes From The Hyena's Belly

Mezlekia, Nega

Biographies & Memoirs

Penguin Canada

Spanning from the 1960s to the 1990s, The Unfortunate Marriage of Azeb Yitades is an epic tale of a small village in eastern Ethiopia struggling to maintain its identity and heritage as the modern world encroaches on its isolation. 
Aba Yitades, the local priest, takes this challenge very personally. The father of three daughters, he is always alert to the new temptations they face—and never more so than when the arrival of a family of American missionaries threatens to put an end to the community's most treasured traditions. Steeped in the rich and unique culture of the Ethiopian highlands, this story of a village's reluctant but inevitable modernization—and one woman's tragic downfall—is told with Nega Mezlekia's customary wit and charm.

Unfortunate Marriage of Azeb Yitades

Literature & Fiction

In this acclaimed memoir, Mezlekia recalls his boyhood in the arid city of Jijiga, Ethiopia, and his journey to manhood during the 1970s and 1980s. He traces his personal evolution from child to soldier--forced at the age of eighteen to join a guerrilla army. And he describes the hardships that consumed Ethiopia after the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie and the rise to power of the communist junta, in whose terror thousands of Ethiopians died. Part autobiography and part social history, Notes from the Hyena's Belly offers an unforgettable portrait of Ethiopia, and of Africa, during the defining and turbulent years of the last century.

Notes from the Hyena's Belly: An Ethiopian Boyhood

Historical

Picador

A Library Journal Best Book Nega Mezlekia's memoir Notes from the Hyena's Belly was described in the New York Times Book Review as "the most riveting book about Ethiopia since Ryszard Kapuscinski's literary allegory The Emperor and the most distinguished African literary memoir since Soyinka's Aké appeared 20 years ago." Mezlekia now offers a first novel steeped in African folklore and teeming with the class, ethnic and religious struggles of pre-colonial Africa. In The God Who Begat a Jackal, the 17th-century feudal system, vassal uprisings, religious mythology, and the Crusades are intertwined with the love between Aster, the daughter of a feudal lord, and Gudu, the court jester and family slave. Aster and Gudu's relationship is the ultimate taboo, but supernatural elements presage a destiny more powerful than the rule of man. With Mezlekia's enchanting storytelling and ironic humor, readers glimpse African deities that have long since weathered away and the social cleavages that have endured through time.

The God Who Begat a Jackal: A Novel

Contemporary

Winner of the Governor General's Award A Library Journal Best Book of 2001
Part autobiography and part social history, Notes from the Hyena's Belly offers an unforgettable portrait of Ethiopia, and of Africa, during the 1970s and '80s, an era of civil war, widespread famine, and mass execution. "We children lived like the donkey," Mezlekia remembers, "careful not to wander off the beaten trail and end up in the hyena's belly." His memoir sheds light not only on the violence and disorder that beset his native country, but on the rich spiritual and cultural life of Ethiopia itself. Throughout, he portrays the careful divisions in dress, language, and culture between the Muslims and Christians of the Ethiopian landscape. Mezlekia also explores the struggle between western European interests and communist influences that caused the collapse of Ethiopia's social and political structure―and that forced him, at age 18, to join a guerrilla army. Through droughts, floods, imprisonment, and killing sprees at the hands of military juntas, Mezlekia survived, eventually emigrating to Canada. In Notes from the Hyena's Belly he bears witness to a time and place that few Westerners have understood.

Arts & Literature

From the author of the hugely acclaimed memoir Notes from the Hyena’s Belly comes a first novel steeped in African folklore and teeming with the class, ethnic, and religious struggles of pre-colonial Africa. Set in eighteenth-century Abyssinia, Mezlekia’s novel beautifully intertwines vassal uprisings and the Crusades with the intense love between Aster, the daughter of a feudal lord, and Gudu, the court jester and family slave.

Dans le ventre d'une hyène

Genre Fiction

Actes-sud

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Mezlekia, Nega. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Mezlekia, Nega

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Mezlekia, Nega. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Notes From The Hyena's Belly

Unfortunate Marriage of Azeb Yitades

Notes from the Hyena's Belly: An Ethiopian Boyhood

The God Who Begat a Jackal: A Novel

Notes from the Hyena's Belly: An Ethiopian Boyhood

The God Who Begat a Jackal: A Novel

Dans le ventre d'une hyène