NoViolet Bulawayo’s debut novel We Need New Names ends its first and last chapters with the same sensory detail: the alternately ‘dizzying’ and ‘delicious’ smell of Lobels bread. It is a smell that wafts through otherwise macabre scenes. In the first, a woman… Read More ›
I came across a meme recently “You know you’re a bookaholic when…” One was “when the first thing you look at in a friend’s house is the bookshelves”. I identified. I house sat for another Africa in Words writer recently,… Read More ›
Mukoma wa Ngugi, son of world renowned African writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o, is currently in London with his father for a public conversation at the Africa Writes festival, and the launch of his new crime fiction novel Black Star Nairobi…. Read More ›
This weekend all three editors of Africa in Words will be at Africa Writes 2013 in London – an African literature and book festival hosted by the Royal African Society. The festival is hosting some of the most exciting names… Read More ›
“Short Story Day Africa exists because we have something to tell the world. About us. In our own voices.” Now in its third year, Short Story Day Africa sets aside the shortest day (or night) of the year – this year it’s… Read More ›
AiW Guest Gbemisola Abiola. Tope Folarin’s Miracle depicts the prevailing belief in Christian supernaturalism, and the apparent promise of prosperity it holds for the African adherent, as the means of achieving success in the Diasporas. While the story is set in… Read More ›
Spotted around the web: short stories, novels and debate. Bakwa magazine: Why does the West ignore intellectual property when Africa is concerned? What does the New York Times really know about music in Africa? Can hip-hop save an artist’s life?, Fashion:… Read More ›
Society for Francophone Postcolonial Studies Postgraduate Study Day “Allah n’est pas obligé: The Location of Islam in Francophone Cultures” University of Stirling, 20 June 2013 Keynote Speaker: Philip Dine (National University of Ireland, Galway) PROVISIONAL PROGRAMME 9:30 – 10:15 Registration 10:15… Read More ›
Chatting to Nancy Richards about AiW on SAfm’s Word of Mouth feature, part of the Literature show, on Sunday (03/03), I was struck once again by the significance of the generative potential of literary and intellectual networks across the continent,… Read More ›
As avid AiW readers will know, last Autumn at the African Studies Association of the UK Biennial Conference, Katie Reid and I co-convened a series of panels on ‘The “post-millennial context” and African writing in English: Writing, production and reception since… Read More ›
ASAUK @ 50 1963-2013 To mark the 50th anniversary of the ASAUK, a wide range of events will be taking place throughout 2013.
AiW Guest Alexander Howard. 1. As the author and editor Jenna Bass points out in the first instalment of her recent interview with Katie Reid of Africa in Words, the bi-monthly fiction magazine Jungle Jim arose out of a shared desire… Read More ›
(Click here for part I.) This, part II of Katie’s interview with Jenna Bass at Jungle Jim, takes us further into the mag, opening up questions of genre – popular, pulp and science-fiction in Africa and South Africa – plus more on the… Read More ›
(Part 2 of this interview is here…) Genre fiction and the rise of African sci-fi; the establishment of literary networks across the continent; the status of independent publishing and bookselling, as well as the significance of DIY ethics and aesthetics in… Read More ›
Further to the previous post, other events joining ‘Censorship Today’ as part of the World Writers’ Conference at Open Book, Cape Town: Excited to see that Njabulo Ndebele and Antjie Krog will be in discussion – ‘Should Literature be Political’, 20 September… Read More ›
Since March of this year, I’ve been working with Billy Kahora at Kwani Trust as Associate Editor on a new literary prize for unpublished fiction manuscripts. Offering cash prizes totaling 525,000 Kenyan Shillings, the Kwani? Manuscript Project calls for the submission… Read More ›
I was at the Cape Town Book Fair back in June (June 15-17, 2012). I approached a range of publishers and booksellers exhibiting and asked what was ‘new’ for them in South African fiction, and to give me their latest fiction-must-reads –… Read More ›
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