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Features, Stories and Poems 2018/04/06

My Name Is Ojwiny | George Ocen | Fiction

In 2012, the Centre for African Cultural Excellence (CACE) based in Kampala, Uganda, launched Writivism — an initiative that identifies, mentors and promotes emerging Africa-based writers, and hosts an annual literary festival in Kampala. In 2017, Writivism celebrated its fifth anniversary and to celebrate this milestone, the initiative, in partnership with the University of Bristol, […]

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Features, Stories and Poems, Submission 2018/03/30

Knife-cuts Like Questions on My Left Wrist | Three Poems by D. E. Benson

Waking, Or Knife-cuts like Questions on my Left Wrist “I wake up and on the other side of the bed is a name that claims me. I cannot conjure what I was before that moment: rays slicing through the wood door are knife cuts like the questions on my left wrist. What is a man? […]

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Features, Stories and Poems, Submission 2018/03/26

Our Husband Grief | Christine Odeph | Fiction

“HAVE YOU GREETED Onindo?” It is impossible for Akello not to smile. How often does your auntie try to matchmake you with someone you might be related to a few hours before you bury your sister? Auntie’s voice is scratchy, the hallmark of a professional mourner. Twenty minutes earlier she had been prostrate on the […]

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Features, Stories and Poems 2018/03/22

The Nervous Conditions of the Mother Tongue | Mapule Mohulatsi

We are republishing select pieces from Selves: An Afro Anthology of Creative Nonfiction, curated by Basit Jamiu and introduced by Otosirieze Obi-Young. Here is Mapule Mohulatsi’s “The Nervous Conditions of the Mother Tongue.” DOWNLOAD: Selves: An Afro Anthology of Creative Nonfiction * “I know nothing that has as much power as a word. Sometimes I write […]

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Features, Stories and Poems, Submission 2018/03/16

Freedom | Sobantu Mzwakali | Fiction

THERE IS NO need to see the sun in these intense blue skies.  It is foreboding, ominous and could be felt; it is in the air. Bright as a firefly, today is a sultry afternoon in the dusty streets of Hani Park – an informal settlement founded in 1993 following the murder of struggle stalwart, […]

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Features, Stories and Poems, Submission 2018/03/09

Notice. Lake Kills | Three Poems by Lillian Akampurira Aujo

Jambula Tree When Sylvie and I are six we eat jambula till our tongues turn indigo then we travel home with night licking our heels. In the morning, our foreheads still anointed in violet blessings, we twine our stick-arms around its branches and stuff banana fibre dolls in the hollows of its roots. We swaddle […]

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Features, Lit Scene, News, Stories and Poems 2018/02/12

The Brittle Paper Digest: 79 Notable Pieces of 2017

It isn’t that time of the year when we look back on what happened in it—that time is December, and this is February. But a delay in releasing this list seemed inevitable for a year that, on several levels, saw our literary culture expand. Organisations took groundbreaking steps: in March, Jalada Africa held a 12-city, […]

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Features, Stories and Poems 2018/02/05

How to Build a Barbecue on Saturday Night | Chisom Okafor | Poetry

My father no longer chefs, but he’d stroll, on weekends, to the next street to sell grilled things outside a cafe, (because veteran culinarians have the toughest skins. Which means they never stop, never really die, only they let themselves wane very slowly into smoke), or he’d sit out at sundown (on weekdays) to journey, […]

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I hold a doctorate in English from Duke University and recently joined the Marquette University English faculty as an Assistant Professor. I love teaching African fiction and contemporary British novels. Brittle Paper is the virtual space/station where I play and experiment with ideas on how to reinvent African fiction and literary culture.

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Features 2018/04/19

New Collection of Plays Shines Light on African Women Playwright

Contemporary Plays by African Women

There are many literary projects making a difference in the way we read and talk about African literature. One of […]

Features 2018/04/19

Chibundu Onuzo is Coming to America! | See All the Dates

chibundu onuzo

US-based fans of Chibundu Onuzo are in luck. Her critically acclaimed second novel Welcome to Lagos will officially be released in […]

Features 2018/04/19

“I Pushed His Hand Away…Gently”: Chimamanda Adichie on Being Sexually Harassed at 17

adichie dior 2

At the Stockholm Forum on Gender Equality, held 15-17 April, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie talked about “a powerful man in the […]

Features 2018/04/18

Poet Nacima Qorane Sentenced to Jail in Somaliland for Advocating for a Reunified Somalia

nacima qorane

A court in the self-declared Republic of Somaliland has sentenced poet Nacima Qorane to three years in jail for her […]

Features 2018/04/18

Brittle Paper Deputy Editor Otosirieze Obi-Young Signs with Booker Prize-Famed Literary Agency

otosirieze obi-young

Brittle Paper’s Deputy Editor Otosirieze Obi-young has joined the client list of David Godwin Associates (DGA), the same agency representing […]

Features 2018/04/18

Agwaetiti Obiụtọ | Watch the Trailer of Onyeka Nwelue’s Riveting New Film

onyeka nwelue - bella naija

Nigerian writer Onyeka Nwelue has a new film out. Agwaetiti Obiụtọ, an Igbo language feature, is a satire focused on the lives […]

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