Tlotlo Tsamaase — The Silence of the Wilting Skin (2020)

The Silence of the Wilting Skin (2020)

The Silence of the Wilting Skin, published in May 2020 by Pink Narcissus Press, is a dystopian novella that follows a young woman whose skin begins to peel away, erasing her cultural and linguistic identity. This powerful visual metaphor interrogates the erosion of languages, the spoliation of memory, and resistance against forces that seek to erase a people.

In an African city, the narrator lives in the wards: her skin color crumbles, people become invisible, and the city decides to destroy the train where the dead are buried. Warned by her grandmother’s “dreamskin,” the narrator rubs herself with insomnia in a despair of preservation. Her brother becomes “Brother,” her girlfriend “Girlfriend” — the loss of names seals the fate of language and culture.

The novella was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award 2021 in the category LGBTQ+ Speculative Fiction (best novella).

Sources and references

1. Open Library
2. Pink Narcissus Press
3. AALBC
4. Wikipedia — Tlotlo Tsamaase