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The 2020 AKO Caine Prize shortlisted stories are written in humorous, tragic and satirical tones.

2020 makes twenty years of the Caine Prize for African Writing - now known as the AKO Caine Prize for African Writing - and this just in, the shortlist for the 2020 AKO Caine Prize for African Writing has been announced. It features five stories that “speak eloquently to the human condition” through a diverse array of themes and genres. This year’s shortlist was determined virtually by the judging panel.
Twenty-eight countries were represented in this year’s eligible entries: Angola/Cabinda; Botswana; Cameroon; Cote D'Ivoire; Democratic Republic of Congo; Egypt; Ethiopia; Ghana; Kenya; Libya; Malawi; Mauritius; Morocco; Nigeria; Namibia; Rwanda; Senegal; Sierra Leone; Somalia; South Africa; South Sudan; Sri Lanka; Sudan; Tanzania; The Gambia; Uganda; Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The shortlisted authors for this year’s Prize are from Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda and Tanzania. They are:


Erica Sugo Anyadike (Tanzania) for ‘How to Marry An African President’ published in adda: Commonwealth Stories (2019)

Chikodili Emelumadu (Nigeria & UK) for ‘What to do when your child brings home a Mami Wata’ published in The Shadow Booth: Vol.2 (2018)

Jowhor Ile (Nigeria) for ‘Fisherman's Stew’, published in The Sewanee Review (2019)

Rémy Ngamije (Rwanda & Namibia) for ‘The Neighbourhood Watch’, published in The Johannesburg Review of Books (2019)

Irenosen Okojie (Nigeria & UK) for ‘Grace Jones’ from "Nudibranch", published by Hachette (2019)

Image via AKO Caine Prize


Excited by this shortlist, and I do not envy this year's judges. I'm making my way slowly through the shortlisted stories, and have started with Chikodili Emelumadu's story on Mami Wata's, which is written in the form of a paper - could even say a journal article.

"Please note: ‘Mami Wata’ (also known in various other regions as ‘Mammy Water’) is used in this context as an umbrella term for both genders of the popular water entity (i.e. Mami and Papi Watas) and does not represent those other mer-creatures without the appearance of absolute humanoid traits. For these other non-humanistic water entities including but not restricted to: permanent mermaids and mermen, crocodile fellows, shark-brides, turtle crones and anomalous jelly blobs of indeterminate orientation, please see our companion volume, ‘So You Want to Kill a Mer-Creature?’ which will guide you through the appropriate juju framework to avoid or deflect repercussions and will elucidate general and specific appeasement rituals. See also, ‘Entities and Non-entities: The Definitive Legal Position on Aquatic Interspecies Marriages, Non-Marriage Couplings and Groupings’"

On the shortlist, the Chair of judges, Director of The Africa Centre, Kenneth Olumuyiwa Tharp CBE, said: 
“We were energised by the enormous breadth and diversity of the stories we were presented with – all of which collectively did much to challenge the notion of the African and diaspora experience, and its portrayal in fiction, as being one homogenous whole.
These brilliant and surprising stories are beautifully crafted, yet they are all completely different from one another. From satire and biting humour, to fiction based on non-fiction, with themes spanning political shenanigans, outcast communities, superstition and social status, loss, and enduring love. Each of these shortlisted stories speak eloquently to the human condition, and to what it is to be an African, or person of African descent, at the start of the second decade of the 21st century.
Together, this year’s shortlisted stories signal that African literature is in robust health, and, as demonstrated by the titles alone, never predictable.”
Joining Kenneth Olumuyiwa Tharp on the 2020 judging panel are Audrey Brown (South African broadcast journalist), Gabriel Gbadamosi (Irish-Nigerian poet and playwright), Ebissé Wakjira-Rouw (Ethiopian-born nonfiction editor and policy adviser at the Dutch Council for Culture in the Netherlands), and James Murua (Kenyan based journalist, blogger, podcaster and editor).
The AKO Caine Prize has had to postpone this year’s annual award ceremony, and hopes to announce the winner of this year’s £10,000 prize in the autumn noting that "the safety of our authors, staff, guests and partners remains a priority, and the Prize will continue to closely monitor the latest government guidelines." Each shortlisted writer will also receive £500.
The shortlisted stories will be published in the AKO Caine Prize anthology, alongside stories written at the AKO Caine Prize workshop - and also through co-publishers in 16 African countries.
Congratulations to the shortlisted authors, and counting down to later in the year when the winner is announced. Until then, I'll be showcasing the shortlisted authors and sharing their stories and more exciting content.
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It's a nice sunny Sunday here (don't worry - I am enjoying the weather from my living room), and I'm back with my round-up of reads. This week saw a mix of oldies and newbies on the reading front. Here, we go! 

Did you know Wole Soyinka sang? Moshood shares this bit of information over on Africa is a Country.

"For a time in his mid-20s, Soyinka was a cafe singer in Paris. Two decades later, back in Nigeria, he wrote a two-track album named 'Unlimited Liability Company'. Although much of the singing was fone by actor and musician Tunji Oyelana & His Benders, Wole Soyinka's voice also features on both tracks." 


Image via discogs

Also on Africa is a Country, Decolonising the Lens by Bhakti Shrigarpure focuses on Rwandan novelists Scholastique Mukasonga's novel Our Lady of the Nile, which has been adapted into a film from French-Afghan writer and director Atiq Rahimi:

"'Our Lady of the Nile' has stayed steadily in the limelight in the last few years. The original French publication in 2012 was followed by the English translation in 2014, as the book garnered awards and acclaim. And now, Rahimi has given it yet another life by bringing it to the big screen Admirably shot entirely in Rwanda, with Rwandan actors and with plenty of dialogue in Kinyarwanda, Rahini's film is visually breathtaking, tightly edited and an emotional rollercoaster. It is no surprise that it has already snapped up some awards at film festivals." 



Still from Our Lady of the Nile via berlinale.de

Over on True Africa, Jackie Budesta Butanda writes about building a sanctuary for creating stories in Uganda.

Next is this piece on the real Lord of the Flies. I first read Golding's Lord of the Flies at 14 for my Literature GCSEs/O Levels, and I remember - even at that age - being mortified by what I read and appalled by the lack of humanity of the boys. This article focuses on six boys from Tonga who were shipwrecked on a deserted island in the 1960s. "What they do, this little tribe? They made a pact never to quarrel."

There's a great new forthcoming series on African feminisms in dialogue, on "how young, African feminist scholars are using their life experiences as sources and resources for theorising their feminism," and Rama Salla Dieng introduces us to it. 

On the film/series front, I'm yet to watch Queen Sono, but Tsogo Kupa writes that Netflix might not be the right home for a new wave of African film and television, and does this by focusing on the new Queen Sono series. 

I also read a lot of music-related content this week - mostly old ones, including a 2014 write-up from Marissa Moorman on Brenda Fassie - "a woman who stepped out of line, talked out of turn, wore the pants, pulled up her skirt, loved women and men," and a throwback interview with Fela Kuti from 1993. Staying with Fela, okayafrica published an interview with Bernard Matussiere on photographing Fela and the Kalakuta Queens. On interviews, check out Yomi Adegoke's one with Megan Thee Stallion, while gal-dem shared some lockdown music, including a new EP from Little Simz, which she recorded during lockdown. 
Image via Africa is a Country

Little Richard passed away this weekend (both Brenda Fassie and Little Richard passed away on May 9 - Fassie in 2004 and Little Richard 16 years later in 2020), and read an older article on Little Richard from 2015 in the Oxford American:

"Music fans are insatiable. The records are not enough. We are historians, anthropologists, archivists, psychologists. Little Richard is not just a legend but one of the last people alive among that first wave of rock & roll, the prime movers and shakers. So it is probably inevitable to treat Richard Penniman like a public treasure." 

Moving away from music, a friend shared with me this read on how today people are finding partners using techniques from management consultancy. 

Finally, Friday was VE (Victory in Europe) Day, and marked 75 years, and my readings centred on the African soldiers that fought for Britain during WWII. First, a photo essay from last year on Britain's Abandoned Black Soldiers. Followed by a video from 2015 on West Africa's soldiers in Burma. That's all for this week. 


Photo via Foreign Policy

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The last week has been a bit weird for me, but I have to say I've been really looking forward to sharing my reads today. Confession! I have an excitement I haven't really felt in a while when it comes to my blog. No idea how long this feeling will last, so I'm going to go with it for as long as it is here. Over the week I've done quite a bit of reading, watching and listening. Here we go!

I begin with an epic list of Morrocan books in English. I aspire to create a list of this nature.

"The below list gathers 172 titles. That's 106 novels, short stories (collections or short stories), and plays; 37 poetry collections or single poems; 21 memoirs and essays, and 12 collective works (not least of which is Akashic Books' Marrakesh Noir, edited by Yassin Adnan, a collection that makes 11 authors available in English are not translated elsewhere)." 

Now where does one start with Moroccan fiction? ArabLit Editor Nadia Ghanem asks. Head over to ArabLit to find out exactly where to. 

Next are three interviews. First, from Africa in Words and a Q&A with Ethiopian-American writer, Maaza Mengiste. On the 'many-layered stories and histories' in The Shadow King, Mengiste had this to say: 

"One of the things that I decided, very, very, very early in my approach was to write a book that reflected history as a series of voices that sometimes conflict. I didn't want to tell a story that was linear. History itself is not linear. It has different narratives colliding, intersecting, and joining, which leave gaps. It means myths, legends, and falsehoods. I really wanted to reflect on the mythic quality of memory and history as one of the many ways that we remember, even if it may not necessarily be the way it happened." 

Followed by Louisa Egbunike interviewing Nigerian SFF author, Wole Talabi on Vector (journal of the British Science Fiction Association). On translating the science that he is interested in (Talabi is an engineer) into a narrative, Talabi explained what makes him take the leap: 

"I think it's probably because of the way I was raised? So much of what I know about science, and history, and politics, I learned through stories.

For instance, I read my dad's entire encycolopaedia collection before I was nine. I didn't really understand 90% of what I was reading, but I was reading it anyway! He has this one encyclopaedia of science and technology, filled with biographies of scientists and philosophers, from the early Chinese philosophers all the way to modern times ... They'd talk about the theories the scientists came up with, but they would also mention that this guy was a womanizer, he was a gambler, this guy stole this formula, or he won it in a card game. So there was always personality associated with the scientific knowledge."  

Finally, three-time Hugo award winner, NK Jemisin says in a recent interview 'it's easier to get a book set in black Africa published if you're white.' Staying in the world of Science Fiction and Fantasy, Jonita Davis writes about the science fiction subgenre becoming a vehicle for Black women artists. 

Image via Yes Mag


In a previous life, I was in the academic world, and this piece in Catapult is from Nadia Owusu on Women of colour in academia often working harder for less respect. I read it a few months ago, but it came back up in my feed and re-reading it. While, it's more America focused, it really reflects some of the reasons why I didn't even think twice about not being in academia at the moment in the UK. 

Less pandemic reads this week, but here are two: one from Carey Baraka on two major epidemics in now Eastern Uganda and Western Kenya that meant his grandfather had to self-isolate over a century ago. Then, a piece on Africa is a Country, which sees Iriann Freemantle reflecting on Africa's eternal lockdown in comparison to Europe's temporary one. 

"As Europeans currently experience these short-lived restrictions on movement, it is an exceptional time to reflect on what Africans endure permanently in all of Europe's name and the significance of freedom of movement to everyone in the world." 

In the world of music, Tony Allen passed away Thursday evening - and Rolling Stones pay tribute to the legendary musician and pioneering Afrobeat drummer, and Gorillaz recently shared a new show with Tony Allen and Skepta.


Screenshot via Daily Motion

I am watching and listening a lot more, and here's a lockdown playlist of Classic African albums from African arguments, as well as a playlist put together by Kalaf Epalanga inspired by the Afrolit Sans Frontier Virtual Literary Festival. Also, check out this short documentary celebrating Black [American] sitcoms. That's all for this week - some of what I've been reading, watching and listening to. 

Screenshot via YouTube
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About me

Founded in 2011, bookshy represents two things: the young me who was so shy I escaped through books, and the older me whose shelf is always one book shy of being full.

bookshy is a space where I celebrate, promote and recognise contemporary African literature - although sometimes I go back in time to commemorate the greats. It is about the books I love, the books I have read and the books that I am dying to read.

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