Meet the 2018 Caine Prize Shortlisted Writers

Meet the 2018 Caine Prize Shortlisted Writers

The shortlist is out! Nonyelum Ekwempu, Stacy Hardy, Olufunke Ogundimu, Makena Onjerika and Wole Talabi will be joining us at Africa Writes 2018 on Saturday 30 June. We will hear hear excerpts from, and discuss their stories.

On announcing the shortlist, the prize’s chair Dinaw Mengestu said:

“The best short stories have a subtle, almost magical quality to them. They can contain through the rigour of their imagination and the care of their prose more than just a glimpse into the complicated emotional, political, and social fabric of their characters’ lives. The stories submitted for this year’s Caine Prize contained worlds within them, and nothing was perhaps as remarkable as finding that in story after story, writers across the continent and in the diaspora had laid waste to the idea that certain narratives belonged in the margins.

“The politics and aesthetics of gender, sexuality, corruption and silence were a constant presence throughout many of the stories submitted, particularly those on our shortlist. These five remarkable narratives are proof that nowhere is the complexity and diversity of Africa and African lives more evident than in the stories we tell.”

The shortlisted writers are:

Nonyelum Ekwempu (Nigeria) for ‘American Dream’, published in Red Rock Review (2016) and republished in The Anthem (2016).
- Read ‘American Dream’
Stacy Hardy (South Africa) for ‘Involution’, published in Migrations: New Short Fiction from Africa, co-published by Short Story Day Africa and New Internationalist (2017).
- Read ‘Involution’
Olufunke Ogundimu (Nigeria) for ‘The Armed Letter Writers’, published in The New Orleans Review (The African Literary Hustle, 2017).
- Read ‘The Armed Letter Writers’
Makena Onjerika (Kenya) for ‘Fanta Blackcurrant’, published in Wasafiri (2017).
- Read ‘Fanta Blackcurrant’
Wole Talabi (Nigeria) for ‘Wednesday’s Story’, published in Lightspeed Magazine (2016).
- Read ‘Wednesday’s Story’

So…it’s time to get reading!

And let us know what you think on Twitter: @AfricaWritesUK.

Plus, you can listen to the conversation between last year’s shortlisted writers on our Mixcloud.

from Africa Writes https://ift.tt/2IMVq6O

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