About
The Caine Prize for African Writing is a literature prize awarded to an African writer of a short story published in English. The prize was launched in 2000 to encourage and highlight the richness and diversity of African writing by bringing it to a wider audience internationally. The focus on the short story reflects the contemporary development of the African story-telling tradition.
The Caine Prize for African Writing is a registered charity whose aim is to bring African writing to a wider audience using our annual literary award. In addition to administering the Prize, we work to connect readers with African writers through a series of public events, as well as helping emerging writers in Africa to enter the world of mainstream publishing through the annual Caine Prize writers’ workshop which takes place in a different African country each year.
The stories written at Caine Prize workshops are published annually alongside the Prize's shortlisted stories in the annual Caine Prize Anthology by New Internationalist in the UK and publishers in eight African countries including, Jacana Media (South Africa), Cassava Republic (Nigeria), Kwani? (Kenya), Sub-Saharan Publishers (Ghana), FEMRITE (Uganda), Gadsen Publishers (Zambia), 'amaBooks (Zimbabwe) and Langaa (Cameroon).
It is named after the late Sir Michael Caine, former Chairman of Booker plc, who was Chairman of the 'Africa 95' arts festival in Europe and Africa in 1995 and for nearly 25 years Chairman of the Booker Prize management committee. After his death, friends and colleagues decided to establish a prize of £10,000 to be awarded annually in his memory.
Eligibility
- Unpublished work is not eligible for the Caine Prize.
- Submissions should be made by publishers only.
- Only fictional work is eligible.
- Only one story per author will be considered in any one year.
- Submissions should specify which African country the author comes from and the word count.
- We require 6 copies of the work in its originally published version.
- If the work is published in a book or journal, we would like to receive at least one copy of the book / journal and five photocopies; but particularly where several stories are submitted from one anthology we would like if possible to receive six copies of the book / journal itself.
- If the work is published online, we would like to receive six photocopies.
Please note that works which do not conform to the criteria will not be considered for the prize. Please do not waste your own time and postage by sending in material which is unsuitable. Works not eligible for entry include stories for children, factual writing, plays, biography, works shorter than 3000 words and unpublished work. If you are not sure whether your work is eligible, please email us for advice.
How do I apply?
There is no application form. To apply please send six original published copies of the work for consideration to the Caine Prize office.
- If the work is published in a book or journal, we would like to receive at least one copy of the book / journal and five photocopies; but particularly where several stories are submitted from one anthology we would like if possible to receive six copies of the book / journal itself.
- If published in a magazine or journal we will accept one original copy plus five photocopies, but would prefer six original copies.
- If the work is published online, we would like to receive six printed copies.
2017 Judges
Judges are drawn from different literary fields including eminent journalists, broadcasters and academics with expertise and a connection to literature in Africa. Five stories are selected for the shortlist by the judges, with one being selected as the winner on the day of the award in July each year.
Nii Ayikwei Parkes
A 2007 recipient of Ghana’s ACRAG award, Nii Ayikwei Parkes is a writer, editor and socio-cultural commentator. He is the author of the hybrid novel, Tail of the Blue Bird, which has been translated into Dutch, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Catalan and Japanese. Originally shortlisted for the 2010 Commonwealth Prize, the book has gone on to win the Prix Baudelaire, Prix Mahogany and Prix Laure Bataillon. Nii serves on the editorial board of World Literature Today and in 2014 he was named as one of Africa's 39 most promising authors of the new generation. He is the director of the Ama Ata Aidoo Centre for Creative Writing at the African University College of Communications in Accra, the first of its kind in West Africa.
Monica Arac de Nyeko
Monica Arac de Nyeko is from Uganda. She won the Caine Prize for African writing in 2007 for her story ‘Jambula Tree’. In 2014, she was named on the Africa39 list - as one of the most promising writers under the age of 40. She currently works for an international development agency in the Middle East. She is working on a novel.
Ghazi Gheblawi
Ghazi Gheblawi was born in Tripoli, Libya, where he studied medicine, and published his first works of fiction. He is the author of two collections of short stories in Arabic and has published various literary works in English in several publications in the UK. He runs and hosts Imtidad Cultural Blog and Podcast, which focuses on literature and arts in Britain and the Arab world. He was recently appointed a trustee of The Banipal Trust for Arab Literature. He is currently an editor at Darf Publishers an independent publishing house based in London.
Ricardo Ortiz
Ricardo Ortiz is Associate Professor of US Latino Literature and Chair of the English Department at Georgetown University. Professor Ortiz is the author of Cultural Erotics in Cuban America (2007) and he has published articles in such journals as Studies in English Literature, The Yale Journal of Criticism, Social Text, Modern Drama, Contemporary Literature and GLQ, in addition to contributing chapters to numerous collected volumes, including The Queer Sixties, Aftermaths: Exile, Migration and Diaspora Reconsidered, Gay Latino Studies: A Critical Reader, and The Cambridge Companion to Latino American Literature. He is currently working on a book entitled The Testimonial Imagination: US Latino Literature and Cold War Geopolitics in the Americas.
Ranka Primorac
Ranka Primorac was born in Zagreb, Croatia. She lived for many years in Harare, Zimbabwe, and is currently based in London. Ranka lectures at the Department of English at the University of Southampton, where one of her duties is supervising doctoral students of Creative Writing. She holds degrees from the Universities of Zagreb, Zimbabwe and Nottingham Trent. Her academic publications engage with the literatures and cultures of Southern Africa; her monograph is entitled The Place of Tears: The Novel and Politics in Modern Zimbabwe; she sits on the Editorial Board of The Journal of Commonwealth Studies and the Advisory Board of Journal of Southern African Studies. She recently became a Senior Research Associate with the Department of English at the university currently known as Rhodes in South Africa. Together with Yale’s Stephanie Newell, she co-edits the Boydell and Brewer African Articulations monograph series.
For more official information click "Further official information" below.
This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:
http://caineprize.com/2017-judges/