She recently published a book on motherhood. In an interview with Arts&Culture, she said she has been invited to the sixth African Writers Conference in Accra, Ghana from November 1-5, 2023. “The African Writers Conference has become a premier platform for writers, readers, publishers, and other creatives to come together and celebrate African literature and culture. Writers across Africa will have the opportunity to explore the vibrant literary scene and connect with like-minded individuals. The conference features talks, workshops, and panels by award-winning authors, editors, and literary agents, providing invaluable insights and tools to help you take your writing to the next level,” she said. Furthermore, Magonare stated that as a published author, she had an interview with a Ghana radio station CITI FM about her second book on Kofi Annan.
She explained that was when she learnt about the African Writers Conference and received the invitation. She is a speaker on fiction and spoken word poetry. The African Writers Conference is a platform for African writers, publishers and bookshops to meet and share ideas on how to grow the literature industry. She explained that she desired to learn and enhance her artistic fecundity. Fortified with such knowledge, Magonare added that she hopes to share with Batswana who are in the creative arts industry. She said the importance of the conference was to meet other fertile minds. “The conference has been designed so that presenters from different parts of the continent share perspectives from their own cultures. The idea then would be to cross-fertilise. This is a learning opportunity and benchmarking opportunity as well. Our literature in Botswana is growing and new authors, writers and poets are also emerging every day. At this level we must come together and be able to sell our own stories and have networking outside our country to push our content outside Botswana,” she stated.
Moreover, she pointed out that it was always important to have support locally as it shows that there was a strong belief in Botswana literature. She added that it was great that local companies like Capitus Sewage Systems and Business Machine Services (BMS) who are suppliers of education stationary and books, amongst others, were actively supporting individuals such as her to attend the African Writers Conference. She said such companies were promoting their culture, adding that it carried weight in building Botswana’s economy. “I’m aware of the fact that local authors have challenges. Firstly writing a book and launching the product needs finances which most of us struggle with. I believe we all have beautiful ideas and if we can collaborate and put them down, we can develop our literature locally and even permeate international markets. There needs to be a means by which literary people can network and see themselves working towards a common goal of getting local literature in its multiple forms out in the public and appreciated by our domestic market. My first published work was at the age of 16 when I responded to a Mmegi essay competition to write about the African Child, for the annual June 16th commemorations,” she said.
