She’s best known as the sublime fiction writer behind The Old Drift, but Namwali Serpell is also a distinguished critic and essayist. For starters, the Zambian novelist, an associate professor of English at UC Berkeley, published her first book of literary criticism Seven Modes of Uncertainty in 2014 and then won The 2019 Brittle Paper Award for […]
Tag Archives: zambian literature
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 […]
Cheswayo Mphanza Wins 2020 Sillerman Best First Book Prize for African Poets, for His Manuscript, The Rinehart Frames
The Zambian-born poet Cheswayo Mphanza has been awarded the 2020 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets, for his manuscript The Rinehart Frames. The finalists were the Egyptian-American Hazem Fahmy for Id, the Nigerian O-Jeremiah Agbaakin for The Root of the Word Babble is Babel, and the Moroccan El Habib Louai for Rotten Wounds Embalmed […]
Namwali Serpell & Tope Folarin Longlisted for Center for Fiction First Novel Prize
Namwali Serpell’s The Old Drift and Tope Folarin’s A Particular Kind of Black Man have been longlisted for the 2019 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, “awarded to the best debut novel of the year.” Both writers won the Caine Prize, in 2015 and 2013, respectively. Serpell’s novel has been a massive hit with critics, with […]
Namwali Serpell on Using a Swarm of Mosquitoes as Narrator in Her New Novel, The Old Drift
Namwali Serpell’s debut novel The Old Drift has been a hit with critics. Hailed as the Great Zambian Novel and reviewed for The New York Times Review of Books by Salman Rushdie, it has been high on reading lists. Recently, the UC Berkeley associate professor of literature was featured on the podcast Reading Women, a […]
Mubanga Kalimamukwento Wins 2019 Kalemba Short Story Prize for Zambian Writing
The 2019 Kalemba Short Story Prize has gone to Mubanga Kalimamukwento, for her short story, “Inswa,” described by the judges as “resonant and gripping.” The $1000 prize, funded and administered by the publishing company Ukusefya WORDS, is awarded to the best work of original and unpublished short fiction written in English by a Zambian, and is in its second […]
Zambia’s Mbozi Haimbe Awarded 2019 Commonwealth Short Story Prize for Africa Region
Zambia’s Mbozi Haimbe has been awarded the 2019 Commonwealth Short Story Prize for Africa Region, for her “Madam’s Sister.” She is the second Zambian to receive a Commonwealth Prize, following Ellen Banda-Aaku’s 2007 win of the defunct Commonwealth Short Story Competition, for “Sozi’s Box.” The short story, like those of the four other winners for […]
Mubanga Kalimamukwento’s Dinaane Debut Fiction Award-winning Novel, The Mourning Bird, Is an Empowering Portrait of Modern Zambia | Read an Excerpt
The Zambian writer Mubanga Kalimamukwento’s novel The Mourning Bird recently received the 2019 Dinaane Debut Fiction Award. In addition to the R35,000 prize money, her book will be released by Jacana Media on 1 June 2019 and will be “supported by Exclusive Books through its Homebru campaign.” Here is a description of the novel: When […]
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