The Words Finesse

A magazine of literary and cultural criticism, Bakwa Magazine, has released its eighth issue, themed PAIN.

Founded in 2011 by Dzekashu MacViban, Bakwa magazine is Cameroon’s leading Anglophone publication of literature, politics, and art. Its editorial team currently comprises editor Dzekashu MacViban, assistant editor Socrates Mbamalu, copy editors Nfor E. Njinyoh and Kelechi Njoku, staff writer Howard M-B Maximus, and editorial adviser Kangsen Feka Wakai. It also explore pain in different forms with an exciting mix of memoir, fiction and poetry.

Bakwa‘s Issue 08: PAIN has contributions from Isabella Morris, Howard M-B Maximus, Ucheoma Onwutuebe, Margot Block, Ani Kayode Somtochukwu, Olubunmi Familoni, and Isabella Morris, Dane Cobain, Stanley Princewill McDaniels, Agogho Franklin, Immanuel James, Leslie Meya, Imhanguelo Angela, Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto, Abigail George, and Kwoh Elonge.

Nigerian author and writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has been named the winner of the 2019 Everett M. Rogers Award.

This was revealed in a press release by The Norman Lear Centre, a multidisciplinary research and Public policy centre with a focus on how entertainment and industry impact society.

This Norman Lear Centre has presented the award since 2007 on behalf of the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism.

The women’s rights activist, critic, and feminist is set to receive the award on February 7, 2019, and speak at USC Annenberg ceremony.

Ms. Adichie’s first novel, Purple Hibiscus (2003), won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize. Her 2013 novel Americanah won the National Book Critics Circle Award and was named one of The New York Times’ Top Ten Best Books of 2013. Her work has been translated into over 30 languages.

“Her voice and her power to inspire made Chimamanda Adichie the unanimous choice for the 2019 Rogers Award,” said USC Annenberg School Dean Willow Bay. “Her visit will continue the global conversation about race, gender and identity to which she’s contributed so forcefully.

Ms. Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single Story” is one of the most-watched TED talks of all time. A MacArthur “genius” Fellow and a member of both the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, she was named one of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2015. In 2017, Fortune magazine named her one of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders.

What is the Everett M. Rogers award?

The USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism is a leader in education and scholarship in communication, journalism, public diplomacy and public relation at all levels.

The award is presented in honour of Annenberg’s late Professor Everett M. Rodgers, the author of Diffusion of Innovations, the second most cited book in social sciences.

The award recognizes excellence in social causes, journalism, media, academia, authoring, and communication.

Read the full press release HERE.

Denja Abdullahi is the President of Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA). His play, Death and the King’s Grey Hair, a metaphorical piece on tenured, monarchical leadership in an ancient African society, is one of the three drama pieces shortlisted for The Nigeria Prize for Literature Prize 2018. The prize is worth $100,000. In this interview with ANOTE AJELUOROU, he reflects on the prize, the challenges of playwriting and books in the country.

Malawian poet, academic, playwright, novelist and diplomat Professor James David Rubadiri has passed on at the age of 88 on the 15th of September, 2018.  Rubadiri, who was Malawi’s first ambassador to the UN and the USA was regarded as one of Africa’s most widely anthologized and celebrated poets to emerge after his country’s independence in 1964.

Rubadiri was born in July 19, 1930, where his father served as a District Officer while his mother was a homemaker who took care of the children as his father worked across the border in Tanzania. He crossed over to Uganda in search of better education and attended both primary and secondary education at King’s College, Budo in Uganda from 1941 to 1950, then Makerere University, Kampala from 1952-56, where he graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in English literature and History, before flying out to the University of London where he studied for a BA in Literature, History and Geography, and graduated with a first class honours degree. He went on to study MA in Literature at Cambridge before receiving a Diploma in Education from the University of Bristol.

After breaking off ties with the Malawian government in 1965, Rubadiri went on exile, teaching at Makerere University from 1968 to 1975, the University of Nairobi from 1976 to 1984, and, upon Wole Soyinka’s invitation, the University of Ibadan alongside Okot p’Bitek. He was further Dean of the Language and Social Sciences Education Department at the University of Botswana from 1984 to 1997. In 1997, he was reappointed Malawi’s ambassador to the UN, and then named Vice Chancellor of the University of Malawi in 2000. In 2005, he received an honorary Doctorate from the University of Strathclyde.

Rubadiri’s poetry appeared in the 1963 anthology Modern Poetry of Africa as well as in Transition, Black Orpheus, and Présence Africaine. His only novel, No Bride Price, which was published in 1967 and was critical of Malawi’s government, has been cited as among the earliest published fiction by Malawians. His other works include the anthologies Growing Up With Poetry: An Anthology for Secondary Schools (1989) and Poems from East Africa (1971), the latter of which he co-edited with David Cook, and the play Come To Tea (1965).

Read An African Thunderstorm by David Rubadiri.

The Jacana Literary Foundation (JLF) has announced a three-manuscript shortlist for the R35,000 Dinaane Debut Fiction Award. They are:

■ Legacy of a Rain Queen – The Eagle’s Martial by Sophia Tao

■ Not to Mention by Vivian de Klerk

■ The Mourning Bird by Mubanga Kalimamukwento

Submissions were judged blindly by a panel comprising: creative writing professor David Medalie, author of the story collections The Shooting of the Christmas Cows (1990), The Mistress’s Dog (2010) and the novel The Shadow Follows (2006); Rehana Rossouw, author of the Etisalat Prize-shortlisted and Humanities and Social Sciences Award-winning novel What Will People Say? (2014) and New Times (2017); and Songeziwe Mahlangu, author of the Etisalat Prize-winning and Sunday Times Fiction Prize-shortlisted novel Penumbra.

The winner will be announced at an award ceremony in October, in partnership with the University of Johannesburg Library. One of the runners-up will receive the R25 000 Kraak Writing Award which will offer the recipient mentoring and intensive coaching from an editor/publishing expert.