Hello From The Caine Prize: #101

We hope you’ve had a good start to 2020, we can’t believe it’s almost the end of January, Christmas seems like a distant memory doesn’t it? If you made New Year’s Resolutions, we hope that you are having success keeping to them. Over here at the Caine Prize we didn’t make any resolutions as such but we did make a resolve that in 2020  communicating with our supporters and with the wider literary community would remain a priority for us, and in this vein we would like to include a regular round up of literary news in our communications with a particular focus on literary news from Africa and the wider African diaspora. We will also be updating you with news from past Caine Prize winners and shortlisted writers.

We’re sure that many of you have been following the Royal Family drama and thinking about the issues surrounding race, identity and discrimination which have been raised. It has been interesting to see the issues that many of us book lovers see robustly tackled in literature from Africa and the African diaspora entering the mainstream.

Outside of Meghan and Harry ‘Megxit’ there has been lots going on, it’s been a busy time in the literary world. Here are some items that caught our attention.

We were absolutely delighted to learn that Margaret Busby OBE, the UK’s first Black woman publisher was announced as Chair of the Booker Prize Judges for this year. Poet and chancellor of the University of Manchester, Lemn Sissay will also be a judge.

2018 Caine Prize winner Makena Onjerika has edited an exciting anthology of fiction from Nairoibi, Digital Bedbugs which is out now

2019 Caine Prize winner Lesley Nneka Arimah wil be at Georgetown University on February 18th presenting “Power and Language”

Cassava Republic Press have launched a literary salon Black: The Literary Salon which showcases wiring from Africa and the Diaspora in London - the line up of events kicks off with Olumide Popoola, Irenosen Okojie and Diana Evans discussing Love and Desire

Looking forward we are entering a busy and significant period of our prize cycle. The deadline for submissions for the 2020 Caine Prize for African Writing is nearly upon us and we have been delighted with the number and quality of stories submitted and know that the 2020 judges will be equally delighted. Do look out for our announcement of the 2020 judges soon.

We are excited about 2020, the 21st year of the Caine Prize and promise to keep you updated, we also want to hear from you, please get in contact with us with news from the literary world you think we may want to share with a wider audience , you can email (info@caineprize.com) or DM us via our social media platforms.

Bye for now,

The Caine Prize team