Mengistu Lemma

Mengistu was the Director General, Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Secretary General of the Ethiopian Literary Society; Council Member on the Ethiopian National Council for UNESCO; Council Member of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church Evangelical Council. On the basis of his outstanding contribution to Amharic literature, he was awarded the 1967 Haile Selassie I Prize Trust Award.

Mengistu was fluent in English, and spoke French and Italian. He travels included New York, Montreal and the Soviet Union (1965), Sweden, Denmark and Turkey (1967), Scandinavia (1969) and Los Angeles (1970).

In 1954, Mengistu returned to Ethiopia and then was sent to the embassy of Ethiopia to India as the First Secretary of the Ethiopian Embassy in New Delhi. There he completed his play Telfo Be Kissie (Marriage by Abduction) (1959), which he had created for a marriage ceremony while he was in Ethiopia. This play was the first modern comedy play in the history of Ethiopian theatre. He also wrote Yalacha Gabicha (Marriage of Unequals) (1964), Tsere Colonialist and Bale Kaba Ena Bale Daba (1979). In addition Mengistu translated Anton Chekhov's The Bear as Dandiew Chabude and J.B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls as Tayaqi. He also published the first Amharic book on dramatic techniques.

In 1948, Mengistu studied in London at the Regent Street Polytechnic before studying economics and political science at the London School of Economics. In the six years he spent in London, he was able to meet and then establish friendship with the famous British playwright George Bernard Shaw.

Mengistu Lemma (1924–1988) was an Ethiopian playwright and poet.