This year’s theme for the Writivism festival is #UnBreakableBonds. This was announced on May 3, 2019 in their website:
The theme for this year’s Writivism activities is “UnBreakable Bonds”. We hope that we are not only defining the unbreakable bonds of our shared and varied Blacknesses across continents but also, the unbreakable bonds between fiction and nonfiction; the unbreakable bonds across generations of African thinkers; the unbreakable bonds between art forms: literature, photography; the unbreakable bonds between the rural and the urban, the unbreakable bonds in the presentation of art: books, exhibitions, podcasts; and what holds it all together: the will, the urge, the yearning to create and imagine worlds, possibilities or really to present it as it is.
As their official media partner Praxis Magazine shall review the shortlisted entries for the prizes this year, review the anthologies for this year UnBreakable Bonds, and And Morning Will Come (forthcoming), preview the Writivism festival and more.
And we all know how it really gets. We don’t want to miss out on these news and opportunities for writers in the continent. (Though, by UnBreakable Bonds this year, Writivism seeks to embrace African writers in the diaspora, too.)
There are usually two prizes. The Writivism Short Story Prize for short stories and the Koffi Addo Creative Nonfiction Prize for (short) nonfiction.
The shortlist was announced on May 20, 2019 with the following writers and their entry stories: For fiction are Frances Ogamba (Ghana Boy), Vuyelwa Maluleke (Tale) and Resoketswe Manenzhe (Maserumo); for nonfiction are Eugene Yakubu (How to Wear Your Body), Frances Ogamba (The Valley of Memories) and Kanyinsola Olorunnisola (The Comedian).
Read our reviews, so far, of the stories below:
A Review of Vuyelwa Maluleke’s Writivism 2019 Shortlisted Story, Tale
Frances Ogamba With the Sentences
Kanyinsola’s “The Comedian” is an inverted portrayal of grief
Manenzhe’s “Maserumo”: a brief history of several deaths
Writivism 2019
UnBreakable Bonds is “an anthology of fiction, photography and nonfiction from Eastern Africa and the UK diaspora. It is edited by Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire, Esther Mirembe and Sumayya Lee.
The Writivism Festival takes place in Kampala from 15th to 18th August, 2019.
Editor’s note: the earlier version of this post said the festival was 15th to 17th August. It is 15th to 18th August. Esther Mirembe was also omitted as one of the editors of UnBreakable Bonds.