Languages
Page last updated at 07:15 GMT, Tuesday, 7 July 2009 08:15 UK

Nigerian scoops African 'Booker'

EC Osondu
EC Osondu used to work in advertising

Nigerian writer EC Osondu has won the 2009 Caine Prize for African Writing.

The award was given for his story Waiting, about displaced people. It has been published in Guernicamag.com, and takes a $16,00 prize (£10,000).

The other four writers shortlisted for the prize were from Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa.

The prize - widely known as the African Booker - is awarded annually for a short story by an African writer published in English.

The award is named after Sir Michael Caine, a former chairman of Booker plc.

Dislocation

The Chair of Judges, New Statesman Chief Sub-Editor Nana Yaa Mensah, described Mr Osondu's story as "a tour de force describing, from a child's point of view, the dislocating experience of being a displaced person."

He was born in Nigeria and worked in advertising in Lagos before moving to New York to study creative writing at Syracuse University.

He received the Allen and Nirelle Galso Prize for Fiction and his story A Letter from Home was recognized as one of the best Internet Stories of 2006.

He currently teaches literature at Providence College, Rhode Island.

Winning the prize includes a month's scholarship at Georgetown University in Washington DC as a Writer-in-Residence.



Print Sponsor


SEE ALSO
'Taboo' story takes African prize
10 Jul 07 |  Africa
SA literary prize winner's joy
11 Jul 06 |  Africa
Literary win for Cape Town writer
11 Jul 06 |  Entertainment
Literary win for Nigerian writer
05 Jul 05 |  Arts & Culture
Zimbabwean writer is Caine winner
20 Jul 04 |  Arts & Culture

RELATED INTERNET LINKS
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites


FEATURES, VIEWS, ANALYSIS
Has China's housing bubble burst?
How the world's oldest clove tree defied an empire
Why Royal Ballet principal Sergei Polunin quit

PRODUCTS & SERVICES

Americas Africa Europe Middle East South Asia Asia Pacific