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)
For up-to-date event details and more information please follow on
https://www.facebook.com/GodwinsOnTourWA/
and share with family, friends, and social networks
Events list (updated on 17 August 2026)
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.
Planet Books will attend the event and have Peter’s books for sale
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, braai, cash bar (beer, wine, soft drinks), and social
gathering on site. Close 2.30pm. Note: cash only, no electronic payment facilities at the venue.
Hosted by RSAWA (Rhodesian Services Association of WA) – the umbrella association for ex-
members of the Rhodesian Security Forces in WA.
Bookings – $10 donation/person, (including morning tea, braai and salads) payable
electronically to RSAWA Inc. account: BSB: 036237, Account No: 420243. Please clearly mark
your payment “Your name, Godwin Talk, 10 October”. And then email John Pritchard
johnpritchard@iinet.net.au with payment details and Christian and surnames of attendees (for
name tag purposes). Those without internet banking can pay John at the door on the day (please
still email John beforehand with attendees’ details).
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
Planet Books will attend the event and have Peter’s books for sale
Date – Sat 10 Oct 2026
Venue – Open Book bookshop and cafe, 124 Wellington Street, Mosman Park
Time – 3.30pm for a 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 as there will be a cash bar available
Bookings essential – tickets $20/person (seating capacity 40)
For bookings – https://www.trybooking.com/DNZDE
Or contact Open Book hello@openbook.com.au or phone (08) 6271 3419
Buy Peter’s books at Open Book and have them personally signed by Peter at the event
Date – Sun 11 Oct 2026
Venue – The River Room, Parade Hotel by the Water, 1 Austral Parade, East Bunbury
Time – 4.30pm for a 5.00pm start – 60 mins – Peter Godwin in conversation with Georgina
Godwin + Q&A
Followed by book signing, meet & greet, food & drinks, social gathering on The Deck (until 9pm)
Bookings – $10 donation/person, (including tea and coffee station)
Contact – contact Pam Lewis ozlewis@bigpond.com to reserve a seat or for updates on the
Bunbury event
Collins Booksellers will attend the event and have Peter’s books for sale
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)
Free bookings – Peter and Geogina in conversation at Clarkson Library – free tickets
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
Honorary 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
Peter’s books are available from the following bookshops:
Open Book, 124 Wellington Street, Mosman Park (08) 6271 3419 hello@openbook.com.au
Planet Books, 23 Napoleon Street, Cottesloe (08) 9284 7070 cottesloe@planetbooks.com.au
Collins Booksellers, 117 Victoria Street, Bunbury (08) 9791 3755 bunbury@collinsbooks.com.au
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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