ZANE Australia is proud to partner with siblings Peter and Georgina Godwin for #GodwinsOnTour this October.
Peter and Georgina will take part in open conversations and informal gatherings, with Peter also signing copies of his books.
Expect something funny, moving and sharply observed: two remarkable Zimbabwean voices talking about home, exile, memory and belonging, themes that will resonate with anyone whose life has crossed borders or who has built a new home far from where they began.
Many of us know Georgina’s voice from broadcasting, first on ZBC, then SW Radio Africa, and now on Monocle Radio. Peter’s memoirs, Mukiwa, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun and The Fear, are rooted in Zimbabwe but speak to much larger questions of family, history and survival. His latest, Exit Wounds, captures something many in the diaspora will recognise: grief for what has been left behind, alongside gratitude for the lives and friendships built elsewhere.
As one of our donors put it:
“We love the ‘new tribe’ we have made here and the wonderful Australian friends who have welcomed us. But we will never forget our beloved Zimbabwe and the suffering of those who have not been as lucky as we have been.”
That is exactly where #GodwinsOnTour and ZANE Australia meet. For more than twenty years, ZANE has supported Zimbabweans of every background whose circumstances are far harder than our own, offering practical help and dignity where it is needed most.
Come along for stories, conversation, and connection, and please share #GodwinsOnTour with family and friends.
Peter & Georgina – #GodwinsOnTour – Western Australia
Fri 9 to Wed 14 Oct 2026
“Conversations between two Zimbabwean-born journalists, writers and broadcasters”
Siblings Peter and Georgina Godwin grew up together in Zimbabwe and have spent their careers reporting, writing and broadcasting around the world. Their conversations combine family history, journalism, literature and the story of modern Zimbabwe.
ZANE Australia is proud to partner with Peter and Georgina for #GodwinsOnTour. For more than twenty years, ZANE has supported Zimbabweans of every background whose circumstances are far harder than our own, offering practical help, and dignity where it is needed most.
ZANE invites you to contribute to this charitable work ZANE-Australia-Zimbabwe-Charity.
All events are open to the public and are free (unless stated otherwise)
Please share with family, friends, and social networks
Events list as at 1 July 2026
Date – Fri 9 Oct 1.40pm – Live radio interview with Peter and Georgina on WA Afternoons with Jo
Trilling on 102.5 ABC Perth. Listen live on 102.5 FM on your radio, or on the ABC listen App.
Date – Fri 9 Oct 2026
Venue – Cottesloe Tennis Club, Napier Street, Cottesloe
Limited Bar – beer, wine, soft drinks and non-alcoholic beer; BYO food (no food on sale at club)
Time – 6.00pm for a 7.00pm start – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina + Q&A
Followed by meet & greet, book signing, drinks, and social gathering
Visit the CTC website at www.cottesloetennis.com.au for court hire, membership etc.
Date – Sat 10 Oct 2026
Venue – RSL Sub- Branch, Osborne Park Memorial Hall at 129 Main St, Osborne Park, corner
Main St and Cape St. Access via slip road which runs parallel to Main St. Plenty of parking.
Time – 11.30 morning tea. 12noon – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina Godwin +
Q&A.
1.00pm – meet & greet, book signing, BBQ, cash bar (beer, wine, soft drinks), and social
gathering on site.
Close 2.30pm.
Bookings – tickets $10/person (seating capacity 80), incl. morning tea, BBQ roll and salads.
Hosted by RSAWA (Rhodesian Services Association of WA) – the umbrella association for ex-
members of the Rhodesian Security Forces in WA.
The RSAWA AGM will be held prior to this from 10.45am to 11.30am.
For membership info: Treasurer, Neville Abrams +61 439 170 423 or nevandstell@gmail.com
Date – Sat 10 Oct 2026
Venue – Open Book bookshop and cafe, 124 Wellington Street, Mosman Park
Time – 4.00pm start – 60 mins – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina Godwin + Q&A
Followed by book signing and meet & greet; drinks and nibbles (included in ticket price); no
BYO drinks but cash bar available
Bookings essential – tickets $20/person (seating capacity 40)
For bookings – contact Open Book hello@openbook.com.au or phone (08) 6271 3419
Date – Sun 11 Oct 2026
Venue – Bunbury TBA
Time – TBA – 60 mins – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina Godwin + Q&A
Followed by book signing, meet & greet, food & drinks, and social gathering
Contact – Pam Lewis ozlewis@bigpond.com to reserve a seat or for updates on the Bunbury
event
Date – Wed 14 Oct 2026
Venue – Clarkson Library (in the main library), City of Wanneroo
Time – 4.00pm start – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina Godwin plus Q&A and
book signing
Followed from 5.30pm – social gathering, book signing, meet & greet, and food & drinks at the
Whale and Ale pub, 34 Key Largo Dr, Clarkson (two blocks from the library)
Still to be announced, other events from Mon 12 Oct to Wed 14 Oct
Enquiries for #GodwinsOnTour – contact Ray at ray.thorne@qut.edu.au or +61 435 658 194
About Peter
Peter Godwin was born and raised in Zimbabwe. He studied law at Cambridge University, and international relations at Oxford. He is an award-winning foreign correspondent, author, documentary-maker and screenwriter.
After practicing human rights law in Zimbabwe, he became a foreign and war correspondent and has reported from more than 75 countries, including wars in Angola, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Somalia, Congo, Ivory Coast, Sudan, South Africa, Bosnia, Kosovo, Kashmir, and Ukraine.
He served as East European correspondent and Diplomatic correspondent for the London Sunday Times, and chief correspondent for BBC television’s flagship foreign affairs program, Assignment now Correspondent), making documentaries from such places as Cuba, Panama, Indonesia, Pakistan, Spain, Northern Ireland, the Philippines, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, the Baltics, and the Balkans as it descended into war. His film, The Industry of Death, about the sex trade in Thailand, won the gold medal for investigative film at the New York Film Festival.
He also wrote and co-presented a three-part series ‘Africa Unmasked’ for Britain’s Channel Four.
He has written for a wide array of magazines and newspapers including Vanity Fair, National Geographic, the New York Times magazine, Time, and Newsweek, the Observer (London), and the Guardian (London.)
He is the author of seven non-fiction books, including: ‘Rhodesians Never Die’ – The Impact of war and Political Change on White Rhodesia c.1970 – 1980 (with Ian Hancock); Wild at Heart: Man and Beast in Southern Africa (with photos by Chris Johns and foreword by Nelson Mandela); Mukiwa, which he received the George Orwell prize and the Esquire-Apple-Waterstones award; When a Crocodile Eats the Sun – a Memoir of Africa (which describes the recent collapse of Zimbabwe) won the Borders Original Voices award and was selected by the American Library Association as an outstanding book of 2008; The Fear: The Last Days of Robert Mugabe; and his latest book is Exit Wounds: A Story of Love, Loss, and Occasional Wars.
Godwin has taught writing at Princeton, Wesleyan, and Columbia. He is an Orwell fellow, and a Guggenheim awardee. Peter has a daughter and two sons, and lives in New York.
Peter Godwin; Facebook; interview by Sara Kanowski on Conversation Hour ABC interview with Peter
About Georgina
Georgina Godwin is an award-winning broadcaster, journalist, and interviewer. Georgina is Books Editor at Monocle Radio, where she presents the flagship literary programme Meet the Writers and hosts the international current affairs programme The Globalist. She also presents Visionary, a podcast from Here East exploring the people shaping the future of technology, creativity, and work.
Born in Zimbabwe, Georgina co-founded Harare’s International Festival of the Arts and helped establish the country’s first independent radio station, SW Radio Africa. Her reporting and advocacy led to her being declared an “enemy of the state” by Robert Mugabe’s government and banned from returning to Zimbabwe.
Georgina regularly interviews leading writers, thinkers and political figures, and chairs major literary festivals and public events around the world. She serves on the board of English PEN and is an onorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Georgina lives in London.
https://bio.site/GeorginaGodwin;
twitter: @georginagodwin;
Instagram @georginacgodwin;
internationalinterlocutor;
Facebook; interview by Richard Fidler on ABC’s Conversation Hour ABC interview with Georgina
About Peter’s Books
Mukiwa by Peter Godwin is a vivid, unflinching memoir of growing up white in Rhodesia during its transformation into Zimbabwe. Godwin weaves together a privileged colonial childhood, his service as a conscript soldier in the brutal bush war, and his return as a journalist witnessing the country’s fraught independence and the Matabeleland massacres. It’s beautifully written, often funny, and refuses easy moral framing — Godwin is honest about complicity, fear, and loss on all sides. A standout entry in the literature of late colonial Africa, and a great choice for anyone interested in Zimbabwean history or coming-of-age memoirs set against political upheaval.
Mukiwa was first published in 1996 and #GodwinsOnTour celebrates Mukiwa’s 30th anniversary
When a Crocodile Eats the Sun is the follow-up to Mukiwa, picking up the story as Zimbabwe collapses under Mugabe’s rule in the early 2000s. It interweaves the slow decline of Godwin’s elderly parents — and a startling family secret his father reveals late in life — with the country’s descent into hyperinflation, land seizures, and political violence. The personal and the national mirror each other beautifully: as his father’s health fails, so does the nation he helped build.
Tender, angry, and elegiac, it’s a powerful portrait of loss on every scale.
The Fear documents the wave of state-sponsored violence unleashed against the Zimbabwean opposition (MDC) after Mugabe lost the first round of the 2008 election. Godwin returns to the country to witness and record the torture, beatings, and murder campaign carried out against ordinary people who dared to vote against the ruling party. It’s harrowing, urgent reporting — closer to war journalism than memoir — but never loses sight of individual courage amid terror.
A gripping, important account of a democracy being strangled, and essential reading for understanding modern Zimbabwe’s politics.
Exit Wounds: A Story of Love, Loss, and Occasional Wars, is Peter Godwin’s fourth memoir, and his most personal yet. As his mother lies dying in his sister’s London home, Godwin reckons with his family’s history, his Zimbabwean childhood, the end of his marriage, and the lingering psychological toll of the wars he covered as a journalist. It’s a meditation on grief, displacement, and the search for home, told with the same eloquence and emotional honesty
that marks his earlier work — an affecting capstone to the story begun in Mukiwa.
* Names and images may have been changed for privacy reasons
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