Kasi Lemmons, director of the critically-acclaimed historical drama Harriet (2019), will be adapting and directing Maaza Mengiste’s The Shadow King (2019). This comes less than a year after the rights for the film were acquired by Atlas Entertainment, the production company behind blockbusters such as Wonder Woman and Justice League. Lemmons said: “Maaza Mengiste’s mesmerizing […]
Tag Archives: maaza mengiste
Watch Maaza Mengiste Talk Writing Ethiopia on PBS
In a feature on the American TV program PBS, the novelist Maaza Mengiste talks about her home country, Ethiopia, which she has always written about. Her family had fled the country after Emperor Haile Selassie was overthrown in 1974. Although the intellectual class and citizens connected to the emperor were targeted, her family was able […]
PHOTOS | The Second Asmara Addis Literary Festival in Exile
The second year of the Asmara Addis Literary Festival in Exile was held from February 27 to February 28, 2020, in Matgone, Belgium. Founded by Eritrean-Ethiopian novelist Sulaiman Addonia, the Festival, according to a description on its website, “aims to be an international home for ideas that migrate freely and boldly in borderless literary landscapes, […]
Maaza Mengiste Receives $10,000 American Academy of Arts & Letters Award in Literature
Ethiopian-American author Maaza Mengiste is one of eight writers to receive the 2020 Arts and Letters Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Each year, the Academy awards “literature prizes, totaling $350,000, to honor both established and emerging writers of fiction, nonfiction, drama, and poetry.” Mengiste was recognized alongside Viet Thanh […]
COVID-19: How Some African Authors Are Reacting to the Pandemic
Like everyone else across the world, our favorite authors are confronted with the threat of COVID-19. Here, we document some of their reactions on social media to the pandemic. These range from providing uplifting advice and offering practical measures to tackling the crisis with a touch of humor. We take all of them as ways […]
Namwali Serpell, Maaza Mengiste & Marlon James Are Finalists for Los Angeles Times Book Prizes
Finalists for the Los Angeles Times Book Prizes have been announced. The Ethiopian novelist Maaza Mengiste is nominated in the Fiction category for her second novel The Shadow King, which is set during the second Italo-Ethiopian war and centers on women who fought in it. The Zambian novelist Namwali Serpell is nominated in the Ray […]
The Anticipated Books of 2020
The year 2019 was full. In December, we released our list of The Notable Books of 2019. In January, we released our list of The Top 15 Debut Books of 2019. Now we look ahead into 2020 with our list of the most anticipated books of the year in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. The buzz […]
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