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    Mami Watas, president’s wives, and a stew – The 2020 Caine Prize Stories

    July 21, 2020 /

    The AKO Caine Prize for African Writing is awarded each year to one short story by an African/ African-diasporic writer. You can read all the stories online via the Caine Prize website. The winner will be announced on July 27th with a film by Joseph Adesunloye. Of course, the question had to come up at yesterday’s 2020 AKO Caine Prize Conversation organized by Africa Writes and chaired by Ifeanyi Awachi: What about the dominance of Nigerian writers? Rémy Ngamjie and Erica Sugo Anyadike – the two non-Nigerian writers shortlisted, though Ngajie in a humorous act just claimed Nigerian-ess and Anyadike revealed to much laughter that she is married to a Nigerian – shifted their gaze away from Nigeria.…

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It's that month of the year, when you (I) realise It's that month of the year, when you (I) realise there are so many books you (I) would love to have finished reading at the end of the year. So here are mine. And no, definitely won't read all of these. But I hope for a few. Any books high up on your list? Ashley Herring Blake: Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail Yvonne Vera: Butterfly Burning (a regular re-read because this is some of the best prose ever) Yasmin El-Rifae: Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution Sofia Samatar: The White Mosque Françoise Sagan: Bonjour tristesse Nokuthula Mazibuko Msimang: The Daughters of Nandi Gogu Shyamala: Father May Be an Elephant, and Mother Only a Small Basket, But… Tsering Yangzom Lama: We Measure The Earth With Our Bodies Casey Parks: Diary of a Misfit. A Memoir and a Mystery Hafizah Augustus Geter: The Black Period: On Personhood, Race, And Origin Ruth Wilson Gilmore: Abolition Geography Huw Lemmey and Ben Miller: Bad Gays: A Homosexual History Pyae Moe Thet War: You've Changed: Fake Accents, Feminism, and Other Comedies from Myanmar Chinelo Okparanta: Harry Sylvester Bird Sinthujan Varatharajah: an alle orte, die hinter uns liegen Tara June Winch: Wie rote Erde Selby Wynn Schwartz: After Sappho Cristina Morales: Easy Reading Dubravka Ugresic Dubravka Ugrešić: FOX Fábio Zuker: Life and Death of a Minke Whale in the Amazon: Dispatches from the Brazilian Rainforest [Image description: All the books named in the caption stacked on a bookcart.] #bookstack #bookpile #books #igreads #igbooks #goodreads #booklover #readerslife
"When the first protests of the Egyptian revolutio "When the first protests of the Egyptian revolution began in Cairo’s Tahrir Square on 25 January 2011 they were focused on police brutality. In fact, the fight for bodily integrity was always a key part of the uprising’s call, along with the keystone chant of ‘Bread, Freedom and Social Justice’." - Yasmin El-Rifae Just one year later, the hope put into the revolution was severly damaged and extreme sexualised violence in form of mass assaults became a regular occurance in Tahrir Square. Yasmin El-Rifae was an organiser with Opantish - Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment - a leftist, feminist group which formed in reaction to these assaults and at its height was made up of hundreds of volunteers who intervened at the square, drove getaway cars, offered first aid and new clothes to the victims and put out political messages about this violence. In Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution, El-Rifae returns to the years 2012 and 2013. Through interviews with other involved people and her own memories and notes, she reconstructs the work of this group but also the aftereffects of this time on them. In short chapter which vary from entries detailing in minute detail scenes from 2012/13 of the group organising, discussing, and being in the middle of the violence trying to get a woman out of the square (and first the circle of violent men formed around here, hence the multiple meanings of the book's title), translated FB entries, interview fragments to reflections. El-Rifae writes with a soft openness about the difficulties to persist, the cracks within the activist group while under immense pressure, the disregard of the topic of sexualised violence (predominently) against women in male dominated leftist discourse, the fissures in friendsships and relationships, feelings of guilt, experiences of immense violence, leaving and returning. To read Radius is to learn about the Egypt revolution, about feminist and leftist organizing, about misogynistic discourses and about sexualised violence used as a weapon to surpress women as political subjects. [Image description: My hand holds up a copy of In Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution.]
International Day of Persons With Disability Here International Day of Persons With Disability Here, we are three years into the Covid pandemic, a mass disabling event which is handled abyssmal in most places (though in different ways), and it's December 3rd, the International Day of Persons With Disability. I feel that everything has been said already. But we have to persist. So some more words today, though no long coherent text, instead just some fragments. An offering. But first, to all fellow chronically ill and disabled people, my heart goes out to you <3 Wearing a mask is deciding to not participate in eugenic politics. If you critique capitalism but do not consider disabled perspectives, you do not fully critique capitalism. Prison abolition is disabiliy justice. It is important to acknowledge that there is a wide variety of disabled experiences and that even people with the exact same diagnosis might differ in their accessibility needs, the ways they relate to their disability and how they feel affected in their daily life. "Functioning" labels are - once again - mostly based in eugenics. Reproductive justice is a disability topic. Ableism and racism are deeply intertwined. Most people have the option to do things in their lives which heighten the accessibility for others. Do so now. Do not wait for governments to tell you to do so. Go out and read texts by disabled writers, listen to disabled activists talk or find out more about the history of disabled resistance; there is such a wealth of knowledge and wisdom. It's okay to rest. The specific idea of productivity at core of many of our societies is not just deeply ableist but also contributes to the distruction of the planet. The climate disaster is a disability issue and crisis. Nothing about us without us, as the slogan popularized by disability acitivsm world wide says. [Image description: Portrait of me, a white fat woman wearing glasses, in front of a bookshelf.] #InternationalDayOfPersonsWithDisability #disability #DisabilityJustice #ChronicIllness #instamoment #ChronicallyIll
#NovemberWrapUp November wasn't a great month for #NovemberWrapUp November wasn't a great month for me. A lot of not great things happened. In the end, I could hardly concentrate on physical books and so I started many which I haven't finished yet. Also I did this little spontanous embroidery project (see two posts back) which again added to my audiobook in take. For each category below I sorted the books roughly from what I enjoyed most to least. I marked all my library loans with (L). Novels/ Novella Billy-Ray Belcourt: A Minor Chorus (L) Mikita Franko (transl. by Maria Rajer): Die Lüge (L) Sarah Thankam Mathews: All This Could Be Different (L) Aiden Thomas: The Sunbearer Trials (L) Monique Ilboudo (transl. by Yarri Kamara): So Distant From My Life Katrin Frank: Dienstag: Homobar Rosalie Knecht: Who Is Vera Kelly? (L) Lana Harper: From Bad to Cursed (L) Val McDermid (transl. by Dr. Kirsten Reimers, Doris Styron, Franz Leipold): Das Mädchen, das den Weihnachtsmann umbrachte: Storys (L) Short form Florian Kessler (ed.): Akzente 3/22: Gute Literatur Poetry Mary Jean Chan, Andrew McMillan (eds.): 100 Queer Poems Lee Hyemi (transl. by Soje): Unexpected Vanilla Non-fiction Elaine Castillo: How To Read Now: Essays Samara Habib: We Have Always Been Here: A Queer Muslim Memoir (L) Moshtari Hilal, Sinthujan Varatharajah: Englisch in Berlin: Ausgrenzungen in einer kosmopolitischen Gesellschaft Ciani-Sophia Hoeder: Wut und Böse (L) Angela Y. Davis, Gina Dent, Erica R. Meiners, Beth E. Richie: Abolition. Feminism. Now. (L) Sharbreon Plummer: Disaporic Threads: Black Women, Fibre & Textiles Annie Proul: Fen, Bog and Swamp: A Short History of Peatland Destruction and Its Role in the Climate Crisis (L) Ursula K. Le Guin: The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction Chelsea Manning: README.txt (L) [Image description: Image 1: My hand holds up a copy of 100 Queer Poems edited by Mary Jean Chan and Andrew McMillan. Image 2: A stack of the books mentioned in the caption - except the ones marked with (L).] #100QueerPoems #poetry #bookstack #bookpile #QueerLitEveryMonth #books #igreads #igbooks #goodreads #booklover #readerslife #justread
Today @brittlepaper published their 100 notable Af Today @brittlepaper published their 100 notable African books of 2022 list! And of course, I had to check how many of the books I have read or am planning to finish reading until the end of the year. 📖Read Safia Elhillo: Girls That Never Die Warsan Shire: Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head Diriye Osman: The Butterfly Jungle Monique Ilboudo (transl. by Yarri Kamara): So Distant From My Life C.A. Davids: How to Be a Revolutionary Noor Naga: If an Egyptian Cannot Speak English Namwali Serpell: The Furrows: An Elegy Akwaeke Emezi: You Made a Fool of Death With Your Beauty Eloghosa Osunde: Vagabonds! NoViolet Bulawayo: Glory 📚Physical TBR Hafizah Augustus Geter: The Black Period: On Personhood, Race, and Origin Sofia Samatar: The White Mosque Chinelo Okparanta: Harry Sylvester Bird Yasmin El-Rifae: Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution Nokuthula Mazibuko Msimang: The Daughters of Nandi 📪Still waiting for my ordered copy Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki, Sheree Renée Thomas, Zelda Knight (eds.): Africa Risen: A New Era of Speculative Fiction (And unsurprisingly I have many, many more on my wishlist.) [Image description: A stack of all the books listed under "read" in the caption and another stack of books - of the books listed under "physical TBR" leaning against it.] #AfricanLiterature #AfricanLit #bookstack #bookpile #brittlepaper #books #igreads #igbooks #goodreads #BooksOf2022 #booklover #readerslife
This week the absolutely fabulous @sharondoduaotoo This week the absolutely fabulous @sharondoduaotoo celebrated a very special birthday and I made this little embroidery thingy with (some of) her books (from left to right: the things i am thinking while smiling politely, Gesammeltes Schweigen, Adas Raum, Herr Gröttrup setzt sich hin, Synchronicity). And very good news for all of you who read in English: Sharon's wildly imaginative novel Adas Raum will be published in English - translated by Jon Cho-Polizzi - in March 2023. It will be published by @riverheadbooks/ @penguinrandomhouse in the US under the title "Ada's Room" and by @maclehosepress in the UK under the title "Ada's Realm". Hope the next decades bring more joy and exciting projects towards Sharon's way <3 [Image description: Image 1: My hand hold ups the embroidery described in the caption. Image 2: Selfie of Sharon Dodua Otoo and I, both wearing heavy jackets outside.] #bookstagram #SharonDoduaOtoo #igreads #booklover #bookworm #readerslife #igbooks #AdasRealm #AdasRoom #AdasRaum #bookgeek #bookish #goodreads #GermanLit #GermanLiterature #instamoment
Do you love bookshops with specific concepts? I ha Do you love bookshops with specific concepts? I have to admit if I have to chose I would always prefer a tightly curated bookshop to a bookshop with overflowing shelves. (I understand the draw of the latter, in theory, I understand what people love about them, but in praxis, personally, I am mostly overwhelmed.) @about_bookshop, which newly opened a few months ago in Berlin, is all about curation. The bookshop has two small rooms. Every three month the theme for the front room changes. It started with "Laziness". The current theme is "Friendship". The second room hosts a shelf with favourites of the booksellers and with some of the best sellers from past themes (and a coffee machine). I absolutely love the idea of this shop and I saw a of books I either knew and love or which piqued my interest (and I did leave the shop with two new books in my bag...). But I will say some of the book choices left me a bit baffled - especially in a bookshop which focusses on curation so intensely and has only so little shelf space. Accessibility: There are two pretty steep steps to get into the store and inside it is pretty narrow. No sign asks customers to wear a mask. Especially the front room - if not many other people are there - felt quiet and not too overwhelming sensory wise. There is a bench in front of the shop. Mostly books in English and German are sold. [Image descriptions: Image 1: Entrance of about bookshop. Image 2: Main shelf in the first room in the bookshop. Image 3: Wall in the bookshop which shows the quarterly themes. "Faulheit" is crossed out and "Friendship" written beneath. Image 4: A yellow shelf with some books on them. Image 5: Space in front of the bookshop with a white bench and a sign pointing to bookshop.] #bookstagram #bookshop #review #igreads #booklover #Berlin #aboutbookshop #bookstore #bookworm #readerslife #igbooks #bookgeek #bookish #goodreads
My weekend reading sorted out, I suppose. Really e My weekend reading sorted out, I suppose. Really enjoyed Delilah Green Doesn't Care by Ashley Herring Blake, so hopening this will be another fun romance. [Image description: My hand holds up a copy of the book "Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail" by Ashley Herring Blake.] #QueerLitEveryMonth #queerliterature #queerbooks #bookstagram #AstridParkerDoesntFail #AshleyHerringBlake #igreads #booklover #bookworm #readerslife #igbooks #justread #bookgeek #bookish #goodreads
"Colonial folklore created a particular set of dat "Colonial folklore created a particular set of data outside the aesthetic or artistic - and the canon we inherit today bears traces of that data gathering. Our mainstream literary discourse continues to read writers of color ethnographically [...] and white writers universally, regardless of the particularities of their artwork." How do we read texts (books, films, other cultural objects, and more)? How do we actually _want_ to engage with these texts and ultimately the world? In eight essays, Elaine Castillo discusses these questions with vigour and care. She dives into the often repeated discussions around empathy (in an essay incredibly titled "Reading Teaches Us Empathy, And Other Fictions), explains perfectly why awarding genocide-denier Peter Handke the Nobel wasn't a great move and how his politics are also part of his writing (this essay did so much for me, as I still remember my pure anger when that Nobel prize was announced) and looks at Asian films and the topic of representation. Her essay "The Limits of White Fantasy", furthermore, should be read by anyone who is even just remotely interested in speculative fiction(s). I think a lot of my politics already alligned with Castillo's before reading this but none of the essays were boring to me as she not just states her case but offers many deep readings of a wide variety of texts - some I have encountered before, others not. While I read "How To Read Now", I also read "Gute Literatur" ("Good Literature") edited by Florian Kessler. This magazine brings together the brief replies of many German language writers, editors, academics, and booksellers (like @sharondoduaotoo, @yaseminaltinay_ and @fatmaaydemir) musing about what makes good literature, which books offered them something special lately, and what literature should "do" anyway. If you can read German and English, this really makes an interesting pairing. [Image description: The two books mentioned in the caption lie on a dark green sofa.] #HowToReadNow #ElaineCastillo #bookstagram #books #igreads #igbooks #goodreads #booklover #readerslife #GuteLiteratur #HanserAkzente
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