The Commonwealth Prize has introduced the regional winners for this yr’s version, with Ugandan author Joshua Lubwama rising triumphant within the African area.
The winners have been chosen after this yr’s prize attracted a record-breaking 7,920 entrants.
The successful tales deal with difficult themes head-on. We learn of a conflict between generations as a boy’s illiterate mom fears and resents the unconventional newcomer; the misplaced reminiscences of enslaved Africans for whom storytelling is their closing act of defiance; the legacy of colonialism mirrored in a demon that threatens to prey on a younger child; the pressures on younger ladies of their twenties to get married and rear kids—or face dire penalties; and the way two younger folks type an unlikely friendship within the face of racism and household stress.
Chair of the Judges, award-winning author and filmmaker, Professor Dr Vilsoni Hereniko, stated: “These tales illuminate many points of human nature and exhibit true mastery of the quick story type. Every story exhibits that geography issues in storytelling. They’re works of fiction which are inseparable from the native tradition and historical past from which they’ve sprung. They’ve color and emotional resonance, and so they moved me deeply. Congratulations to the regional winners!”
Joshua Lubwama is a software program engineer and author primarily based in Kampala, Uganda. He was longlisted for the 2024 Commonwealth Brief Story Prize and the 2023 and 2024 Afritondo Brief Story Prizes. His work seems in The Anatomy of Flying Issues and Travelling Males Don’t Die. In Lubwama’s successful story, “Moms Not Showing in Search”, a younger boy befriends a lady who has just lately moved into the neighbourhood, a lot to his mom’s displeasure.
Reacting to the announcement, Lubwama stated, “Profitable the 2025 Commonwealth Brief Story Prize for the Africa Area has given me licence to dream. For this story—‘Moms Not Showing in Search’—to attraction to a world panel of judges means the world to me. At some point you’re spending lonesome hours on the eating desk wrestling a narrative into existence—with the complete course of shrouded in self-doubt—after which the following, these Commonwealth Basis persons are telling you they’re completely thrilled to let you understand that you simply’re shortlisted, after which there’s extra. It’s actually a testomony to the ability and skill of tales to attach us via our shared experiences, every of us recognising bits and points of our personal lives within the tales of others.”
Nsah Mala, decide for the African area on this yr’s prize, lauded Lubwama’s story for its “elegant prose, sense of humour, and thematic novelties.”
This yr’s shortlisted tales hail from 18 Commonwealth nations, together with Antigua and Barbuda and Saint Lucia for the very first time. Ranging in age from 21 to 75, all however one have by no means been shortlisted earlier than. There are tales of exploitation, racism, greed, vanity and betrayal, but in addition surprising kindness, humour, braveness and resistance, and the surprising results of small actions.
Chair of the Judges, author and filmmaker Dr Vilsoni Hereniko from Rotuma, Fiji, stated: “A terrific story strikes us, causes us to assume, and generally adjustments us. This shortlist of related, vibrant, and important studying is made up of one of the best 25 tales from a pool of just about 8,000 entries. Collectively, they exhibit why the quick story type should proceed to be supported and promoted.”
The 5 regional winners will undergo to the ultimate spherical of judging, and the general winner might be introduced on twenty fifth June 2025. Their tales might be revealed on-line by the literary journal Granta. The regional winners obtain £2,500 and the general winner receives a complete of £5,000.
Click on right here to learn extra in regards to the Commonwealth Brief Story Prize.