Press - Maneo Mohale

The Johannesburg Review of Books • 17th February 2023

'I wanted to place myself in conversation with the living and the dead’—Maneo Refiloe Mohale in conversation with Makhosazana Xaba

JRB Patron Makhosazana Xaba aims to correct the misdeeds of the past by engaging black women and non-binary poets seriously on their ideas and on their work.

cultureafrica • 9th September 2022

African Book Festival in Berlin 2022. A Report. (Press)

Yesterday.Today.Tomorrow. That was the leitmotif of this year’s African Book Festival in Berlin.

SCAFFOLD | for queer creators and culture • 1st December 2021

Scaffold Profile & Interview

"Work that has changed my life is work that makes me feel possible. I think I want someone to pick up my work, and feel like they’re possible too."

Full Stop • 14th September 2021

Silent Still, Singing Still (Review)

Review of Kopano Maroga & Maneo Mohale's debut collections, by Keely Shinners.

EWN • 18th June 2021

Glenna Luschei Award (Interview)

"Maneo Mohale recently won the 2020 Glenna Luschei Award for African Poetry for their debut collection Everything Is A Deathly Flower.The Glenna Luschei Award, named after US American philanthropist and poet Glenna Luschei, is said to be the only pan-African book prize of its kind, which awards African poetry written in English or in translation by recognising a significant book published each year by a poet on the continent." Interview by Palesa Manaleng

Brittle Paper • 11th June 2021

South African Maneo Mohale is Winner of the Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry

"South African poet Maneo Mohale has received the 2021 Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry for their collection Everything is a Deathly Flower. "

Nebraska Today • 4th June 2021

Mohale wins Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry

South African poet Maneo Refiloe Mohale has been named the winner of the African Poetry Book Fund’s 2020 Glenna Luschei Prize for African Poetry.

ROOM Magazine: Special Issue • 15th January 2021

On Community, Language & Ancestors (Interview)

"I left my interview with Maneo buzzing with energy, inspired by our conversation about the Sesotho language, the messiness of time, the potential of poetic forms, the expansive, complicated landscape of trauma and memory, the humour of learning, and joy." Interview by Selina Boan

The Johannesburg Review of Books • 3rd July 2020

2020 Ingrid Jonker Prize for English Poetry shortlist announced

- All the Places by Musawenkosi Khanyile (uHlanga Press, 2019)
- Everything is a Deathly Flower by Maneo Mohale (uHlanga Press, 2019)
- Skeptical Erections by Mxolisi Dolla Sapeta (Deep South, 2019)
- Zikr by Saaleha Idrees Bamjee (uHlanga Press, 2018)

Bubblegum Club • 12th March 2020

Every Deathly Flower and its Stem (Interview)

"In order to speak the unspeakable, to illuminate the night room, Mohale invites onto their pages the words of others; to stand vigil, to bear witness and to harness their words as lighthouses to navigate the torrid waters of violence, blackness, queerness, femininity, ancestry, memory and the unending labour of healing, undoing and becoming."

City Press • 17th November 2019

A candid offering, both serene and piercing (Review)

"Reading this work is like listening to an Esperanza Spalding and Nina Simone collaboration album, a duet between thorns and petals that is both piercing and serene."

The Johannesburg Review of Books • 4th November 2019

A perfectly shaped raging fire of language and emotion (Review)

"Mohale is only twenty-seven years old, and yet they command, not only language, but politics, emotions, in a way that very few writers do. The book is filled with sentences, sensibilities, that are molded in perfection."

Artskop3437 • 28th October 2019

Everything Is a Deathly Flower (Interview)

“For many writers, the process of writing can be a purification and purgation of emotions, a renewal and restoration, but Mohale speaks of it as “a very painful process punctuated with little miraculous moments of discovery, a container for complicated truths”.

The Commune • 21st October 2019

Event: Johannesburg launch of “Everything is a Deathly Flower”

Joined by Megan Ross and Letlhogonolo Mokgoroane, Mohale grappled with sexual assault and the process of reconstructing life thereafter through their collection.

M&G Online • 3rd October 2019

Creating poetry out of violence

"First, I wrote the book to prove to myself, “Can I write this book?” But also to see whether I can make something very beautiful out of this awful thing as a way of proving something about beauty; proving something about violence; proving that violence can be written without reproducing, sensationalising or romanticising it."

New Frame • 2nd October 2019

Poetry Review | Everything is a Deathly Flower

"Mohale’s command of language, originality of voice and confluence of the mystic and material mark an exciting new moment for South African poetry."

Between 10 and 5 • 1st September 2018

BAYEZA18: 40 Creatives Under 30

"Maneo Refiloe Mohale breaches the boundaries of community activism, poetry and story-telling with a queer focus, seamlessly."

She Leads Africa • 16th April 2018

Incredible Womxn in Art: Maneo Mohale

"We had the amazing opportunity to pick Maneo’s brain and chat about all the things that move her."

Between 10 and 5 • 12th September 2017

10 womxn blazing trails across Africa's art scene

"Maneo’s writing has appeared across South African publications on subjects such as the role of contemporary poetry and the politics of the tag #blackgirlmagic."

Between 10 and 5 • 12th June 2017

Spotlight: On publishing and portraiture with Ian McNair, Maneo Mohale and Ed Blignaut

"Sharing a combined background in writing, editing, event production and more within the arts industry, Maneo and Ian are steering Platform towards a more inclusive, accessible and passionate space."

/ Su La Po / • 25th April 2017

Wonder Womxn: Irving Chong learns from the female Forces of 2017

"Maneo Mohale is mighty. She is a wordsmith, baker-alchemist, black queer femme and the 2016 Bitch Media Writing Fellow in Global Feminism. Her writing intersects with everything."