Links
Awards
Caine Prize for African Writing (www.caineprize.com ) is often described as the “African Booker.” The award has been presented to the best African short story writers since 1999.
Commonwealth Writer’s Prize (www.commonwealthfoundation.com/culturediversity/writersprize) was established to encourage and reward the upsurge of new Commonwealth fiction.
Macmillan Writer’s Prize for Africa (www.writeforafrica.com) is a biennial competition devoted to previously unpublished works of fiction by African writers.
The Noma Award for Publishing in Africa (www.nomaaward.org) is a Pan-African prize worth US$10 000 for an outstanding book published in Africa.
Olaudah Equiano Prize for Fiction (www.equianoprize.blogspot.com) was set up in 2005 specifically for those African writers who no longer live on the continent but elsewhere.
Book Fairs
Cape Town Book Fair (www.capetownbookfair.com) is a new book lover’s gathering held in the beautiful port city of Cape Town, South Africa.
The Zimbabwe International Book Fair (ZIBF) (www.zibfa.org.zw) is sub-Saharan Africa’s premier book and publishing fair, held in the Harare Gardens.
Festivals
Hay Festival (www.hayfestival.com) is an international festival company with annual literary events in Colombia, Spain and Wales and next year in Africa and America.
Poetry Africa (www.nu.ac.za/cca/Poetry_Africa.htm) is a six day international poetry festival held in Durban, SouthAfrica hosting poets from the African continent and elsewhere.
The Time of the Writer (www.nu.acc.za/cca) is an annual international festival that features predominantly South African writers and those from elsewhere on the African continent.
Literary Magazines
Authorme (www.authorme.com) is an international website that publishes young writers.
Botsotso (www.botsotso.org.za) is a grouping of poets, writers and artists who wish to create art about the varied cultures and life experiences of people in South Africa.
Chimurenga (www.chimurenga.co.za) is a publication of arts, culture and politics from and about Africa and its Diasporas and has been in existence since 2002.
Farafina (www.farafinamagazine.com) is a magazine published from Nigeria for Africans and people of African ancestry all over the world.
Kwani? (www.kwani.org) is a Kenyan literary magazine started by the 2002 Caine Prize winner, Binyavanga Wainaina. He says of it, ‘We are a magazine of ideas. We seek to entertain, provoke and create.’
Sea Breeze Journal of Contemporary Liberian Writings (www.liberiaseabreeze.com)is a quarterly peer review e-journal devoted to publishing fiction and non-fiction by Liberians ‘arising out of Liberian life wherever we are.’
SABLE LitMag (www.sablelitmag.org) is an international publication run by Kadija Sesay for writers of colour.
Transition (www.transitionmagazine.com)started in Kampala, Uganda in 1961. It was the brainchild of a 21-year old writer of Indian descent named Rajat Neogy and quickly became Africa’s leading intellectual magazine. Harvard professor, Henry Louis Gates Jnr revived Transition back to life in 1991.
Wasafiri (www.wasafiri.org) is a literary magazine at the forefront in mapping new landscapes in contemporary international literature today.
Other Internet Resources on African Literature
Stanford University research page on African literative
http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/lit.html
Crossing Borders Creative Writing Project is a British Council and Lancaster University initiative that used information technology to link young writers in Africa with experienced mentors in the UK. www.crossingborders-africanwriting.org
Transcultural project is run by the English Department at Lancaster University providing an interlinking virtual support network between young writers in Africa with British writers and academics. www.transculture.org