The Words Finesse

Three Nigerian authors, Oyinkan Braithwaite, Emezi Akwaeke and Diana Evans have been nominated for the 2019 Women’s Prize for Fiction.

The Women’s Prize for Fiction, previously known as the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Baileys Women’s Prize For Fiction, is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the world.

The News Agency of Nigeria reports that Braithwaite was nominated for her book ‘My Sister, The Serial Killer’, Emezi for ‘Freshwater’ and Evans for ‘Ordinary People’.

‘My Sister, The Serial Killer’ tells the story of the complex relationship between a glamorous Lagos fashion designer and her responsible older sister, who’s always ready with bleach and rubber gloves to help cover up a crime.

Emezi’s ‘Freshwater’ explores the multiple voices of an Igbo god living within a young woman.

Evans’ ‘Ordinary People’ cleverly exposes the melancholy of suburban middle-class black people using celebrity events. The book opens at a party thrown in honour of Barack Obama’s presidential victory in 2008.

The prestigious prize has honoured many great authors since it was launched in 1996, including Chimamanda Adichie, who won in 2007 for ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’.

NAN reports that the award gives a significant career boost and it comes with a £30,000 ($40,000) prize.

It was created after the Bookers Prize of 1991 where none of the six shortlisted books was by a woman, despite 60 per cent of novels that year being published by female authors.

Chaired by Prof. Kate Williams, the 2019 judging panel includes journalists Dolly Alderton and Arifa Akbar, anti-FGM activist Leyla Hussein.

NAN reports that Sarah Wood OBE, the chair and co-founder of the global video advertising marketplace, Unruly, was also on the panel.

Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Kwara State chapter on Wednesday, the 17th of October, 2018, organised a Special Reading session in honour of late Justice Mustapha Adebayo Akanbi in recognition of his invaluable contributions to scholarship and literary development in the country.

The Association also dedicated an anthology to late Akanbi, who was also a writer and poet in his own rights during his life time.

Speaking during the event held at African People's Hall, Onikanga, G. R. A, Ilorin, the ANA state Chairman, Malam AbdulRahman Aderinoye said the production of anthology in the name of Justice Akanbi was borne out of the former President of the Court of Appeal’s tremendious support to the Association when he was alive.

Malam Aderinoye explained that late Honourable Justice Akanbi was a strong pillar of support for ANA as he did everything humanly possible to promote reading culture through personal donations and self production of literary works.

He eulogised Justice Akanbi’s other related support and assistance for the growth and development of literary works and reading culture in the society.

Speaking on behalf of Akanbi’s family, Professor Muhammed Mustapha Akanbi expressed delight over the recognition and commended ANA for keeping the memory of their father, late Justice Akanbi, alive.

Professor Akanbi who doubles as Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), said the reading session in honour of his father was very apt and worthwhile, adding that the event was a continuation of his father’s dreams in ensuring that all Nigerian children are well educated.

“I feel highly delighted because this is the way of putting the memory of our late father in front burner. While he was alive, he believed in scholarship and for ANA to organise this reading session, it is a continuation of dreams he had to ensure that as many as Nigerian youth are educated.” Professor Akanbi said.

Also speaking, Dean of the Faculty of Law, Professor A.T. Shehu, who represented the Vice Chancellor of Al-Hikmah University at the occasion said late Justice Akanbi lived a life of integrity that worth celebrating. 

"Baba was one of the greatest man I have met on earth. He lived a life of integrity and up to today we are celebrating him."

"Nobody will lay hands on justice Akanbi's judgement and will say it's a trash and lacks honesty and integrity he lived and preached." He said.

Professor Shehu thanked the organiser for organizing such gathering in the late Wakili Ilory's honour.

Other dignitaries like Chairman, Mustapha Akanbi Foundation, Dr Mashood; and Chief Librarian, National Library, Ilorin Branch, Mrs Olani in their good will messages lauded great contributions of the late legal icon in promoting reading, writing and listening skills as well as good reading culture. 

They also outlined his various landmark achievements in the cause of adding values to lives and serving the humanity.

Anchored by the Kwara ANA Secretary, Mr Babayemi Opeyemi, the session witnessed reading from the late legal luminary's works and poetry presentations by members of the Association as well as from the students of the Secondary schools present. 

Kwara ANA members such as Col. Oladele Babajamu (rtd.), Mr Iyanda Suleiman Ayinde, Mr Mubarak Oladosu, Mrs Betty Ige, Mr Braimoh Abdulrasak, Mr Saliu Ahmad Toyin, Mr Sheriff Olanrewaju, and Mr Abdulhafeez T. Oyewole made beautiful reading from the late jurist's works and rendered poems in his honour, while some students from the invited schools like Kamaldeen Muhsinat (from Nana Aishat Academy) and Abubakar Ola-AbdulHamid (Army Day Secondary School) equally perfomed their beautiful poems in honour of the late judge.

The students of the represented secondary schools across Kwara state were in turn left with so much of good lessons, virtues and wisdom to tap from the reading session, as they listened to the remarks of members of the high table on the life and time of the first Wakili of Ilorin, Honourable Justice Mustapha Akanbi, CFR, PCA (rtd.).

The shortlists for the Betty Trask, McKitterick, Tom-Gallon and Somerset Maugham awards have been announced by The Society of Authors, with Nigerian writer Anietie Isong, amongst the 22 shortlisted names.

The four prizes will be awarded at The Authors’ Awards on Thursday 19th July, in London, a unique night of riches with all the awards judged by authors for authors.

The event has rewarded the early works of some of today’s most prominent literary figures such as Zadie Smith, Seamus Heaney, Helen Dunmore, Hari Kunzru, Carol Ann Duffy and Mark Haddon.

The evening will see the UK’s biggest literary fund of more than £98,000 awarded to established and emerging writers of fiction, non-fiction and poetry.

Anietie Isong is shortlisted for the McKitterick Prize, for his debut novel, Radio Sunrise.

Frances Fyfield, McKitterick judge says of Radio Sunrise: "A small volume, staying long in the imagination, with the huge backdrop of a young, utterly likeable Nigerian journalist trying to live a life and get ahead. Lovely, simple first-person narrative of youthful manhood, getting it wrong, getting it right, learning on the hoof. Makes the reader long to meet him, while engendering both hope and despair for the society he inhabits, all enlivened by humour."

Anietie Isong has worked as a journalist, speechwriter and public relations manager in the UK and in Nigeria. His writing has received some awards, including a Commonwealth Short Story Award.

Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has won this year's PEN Pinter Prize.

Named in memory of playwright Harold Pinter, the prize celebrates his respect for British and Commonwealth writers who take an "unflinching, unswerving" look at the world.

The judges praised Adichie's "sophisticated" approach to "gender, race and global inequality".

The Half of a Yellow Sun author described the award as an "honour".

"I admired Harold Pinter's talent, his courage, his lucid dedication to telling his truth," she said.

Adichie will receive the award - established by literary charity English PEN - at a ceremony at the British Library in October, where she will deliver an address.

This will include announcing the writer named this year's International Writer of Courage, reflecting English PEN's support for freedom of expression in the face of danger.

A limited edition anthology of 10 Pinter Prize lectures will be printed to celebrate the prize's 10th anniversary.

Adichie's debut novel, Purple Hibiscus, won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize in 2003. It was followed three years later by Orange Prize winner Half of a Yellow Sun.

An outspoken feminist, she delivered two hotly debated Ted talks that were published as a book titled Why We Should All Be Feminists in 2014.

Lady Antonia Fraser, Harold Pinter's widow, said she greeted the award of the prize with enthusiasm.

"Not only is Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie a brilliant, compelling writer but she embodies in herself those qualities of courage and outspokenness which Harold much admired," she said.

Antonia Byatt, director of English PEN, said Adichie's writing and activism had "travelled across so many frontiers, showing us what is important in the world".

"She is a very worthy winner of this extraordinary prize."

The PEN Pinter Prize is awarded annually to a writer from Britain, Ireland or the Commonwealth.

Recent recipients include Margaret Atwood, Sir Salman Rushdie and the poet James Fenton.

After spending several weeks to go through over more than 1000 stories submitted for the Dusty Manuscript Contest, the judges of the competition have selected their top 20 entries.

According to the 8th Edition of Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, psychology is defined as the scientific study of the mind and how it influences behaviour.  In singular term, it means the kind of mind that somebody has that makes them think or behave in a particular way. To cap it off, it is how the mind influences behaviour in a particular area of life.