Description
A jailer’s love poems ghost-written by a prisoner… Love blossoming between two girls despite the horror of their community… Street kids stick-fighting or stealing guavas from the rich… A dystopian world where women must go naked until they marry…
Celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the Caine Prize for African Writing – often referred to as the ‘African Booker Prize’ – this collection showcases all twenty prize-winning short stories, each with its own unique take on modern African life.
As Ben Okri says, in his first special introduction for this anthology: ‘Whether in the cities or in the villages, whether it is in East or West or South or North Africa, something pulses through the varied and oddly unified life of the continent that lends itself to the framing that the short story excels at. Whether it is the celebration, the marketpalce, the bus stop, the ritual, the family, the funeral, comradeship, grisly death, sexual awakening, the short catches the experience holds it at an angle, illuminates it.’
Leila Aboulela Sudan, 2000
Helon Habila Nigeria, 2001
Binyavanga Wainaina Kenya, 2002
Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor Kenya, 2003
Brian Chikwava Zimbabwe, 2004
S.A. Afolabi Nigeria, 2005
Mary Watson South Africa, 2006
Monica Arac de Nyeko Uganda, 2007
EC Osondu Nigeria, 2009
Olufemi Terry Sierra Leone, 2010
NoViolet Bulawayo Zimbabwe, 2011
Rotimi Babatunde Nigeria, 2012
Tope Folarin Nigeria, 2013
Okwiri Oduor Kenya, 2014
Namwali Serpell Zambia, 2015
Lidudumalingani South Africa, 2016
Bushra al-Fadil Sudan, 2017
Makena Onjerika Kenya, 2018
Lesley Nneka Arimah Nigeria, 2019
