[1][2] Mengistu was born in Harar, to Aleqa Lemma Hailu and Wro Abebech Yilma.
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.
In addition, Mengistu translated Anton Chekhov's The Bear as Dandiew Chabude and J.B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls as Tayaqi.
His travels included New York, Montreal and the Soviet Union (1965), Sweden, Denmark and Turkey (1967), Scandinavia (1969), and Los Angeles (1970).
Different social and political, as well as traditional and cultural issues dominate the plays of Mengistu Lemma: