Tag Archives: Delight

Jacqueline ‘pretty poet’ Kibacha

United Kingdom No Comments

Artist and Writer Jacqueline Kibacha, also known as the Pretty Poet, has a passion for words and a heart to raise the voice of the voiceless. As a creative strategist she uses her poetry to document and respond to the tensions that occur in the world around her and the human soul within.

Originating from Tanzania, living in the Middle East and currently settling in United Kingdom, Jacqueline Kibacha has gained an understanding of issues faced by her brothers and sisters across continents in the light of different cultures, faiths, relationships and politics. It’s hard to be exposed to so many places and not gain a love and appreciation of the colours, textures and rhythms and sounds from East to West. All of these are incorporated in her poetry and music.

Her pre-poetry performance background is in acting and singing. Being a soloist in various choirs, classical to gospel, and also the lead female vocalist of a reggae-funk band that was born in the North East of England. Her creative influences include artists such as Lauryn Hill and Nina Simone who match the weight and richness of their voice with lyrical content that is thought provoking and socially aware.

Kibacha has been a newspaper columnist but has also studied and enjoyed creative writing and is fascinated by the power of words. Through organising music events she has cultivated an eclectic taste in music, which fuelled experimentation that started with sounds and words. In her pieces she fuses the love for words with music, collaborating with DJs, musicians and producers to create poetry with a purpose beyond words on a page.

With a professional background in project planning and community development Jacqueline Kibacha works with like-minded organisations to set up projects that use creativity to address needs, gaps, issues and obstacles in the community.

Jumi

Nigeria No Comments

Jumi who holds qualifications in Dental Surgery and Medical Informatics is the Creative Enthusiast behind IMOLE, Jumi’s Spoken Cabaret is an innovative compilation of ten inspirational tracks of ironic weaves of recitals, songs, poetry, word games, wit, metaphors and subtleties set to varying genres of music.

Jumi sees poetry as a fascinating tool that gives expression to a passionate and unorthodox voice. She clearly feels very much a part of her audience and believes that in listening incisively they will find twists, turns and whimsies of our collective destiny food for inspired thought.

A “proudly Nigerian” poet, vocalist and lyricist with a tender tough stripe of cultural louche and spiritual commentary, Jumi’s artistic style is bold and imaginative with a conversational voice that sounds almost reticent.

In Jumi’s Spoken Cabaret, she maximizes this compelling and inimitable style to ride hot currents for the pain and pleasure of swooping around spiritual, pure, social, maternal and fragile subjects. Whilst doing this, she clings to images of reality that are firmly embedded in what she perceives to be the public’s consciousness, acknowledging issues people feel they are familiar with or can relate to, offering a speculative but entirely plausible view.

Exposure to Yoruba griot sounds, classical forms of music plus a need for and hunger to express truth’s tale becomes tension released in distinct ways in each of the ten tracks on the CD. From deep sentiments to an indigenous groove set to a lush vocal background to epics of gratitude carrying a sensual earthiness, the entire production is a consolidation of international and traditional styles fused into a deeply personal approach.

Jumi is happily married to her friend Kola and has three daugthers.

Jimmy Rage

Netherlands No Comments

Jimmy Rage is a visual artist, performer and writer. He has had live poetry and art performances in the Netherlands, Belgium, U.K. and the U.S. and participated in group exhibitions all over the world.

Jimmy Rage has been a regular contributor to the KAGABLOG since its beginnings in 2005. Daily updates feature the poetry, short stories and artwork of Jimmy. Other work includes Jazzing through the Ages Liner notes for the John Coltrane Tribute Album – produced by Kindred Spirits. Jimmy Rage is also a regular contributor to CLAM Magazine in Paris. His latest contributions include the following: Growing Up – Selection of short stories and poems published in CLAM Magazine fall/winter edition 2007/8 and Escape – short story: When I Was in the Bush published in CLAM Magazine spring/summer edition 2007.

Jessica Mbangeni

South Africa No Comments

Born and raised in the Eastern Cape, Jessica Mbangeni is one of South Africa’s most sought after female Imbongi (praise singer), and has made her mark in male dominated cultural terrain. Invoking the role of this ancient tradition, largely influenced by her grandmother’s isiXhosa storytelling in the village of Nqamakwe, she offers insightful commentary on contemporary affairs. She has performed alongside numerous musical icons, such as Dolly Rathebe and Dorothy Masuka.

Jane Okot P’ Bitek Langoya

Uganda No Comments

Jane Okot P’ Bitek Langoya is a Ugandan poet and is one of the children of legendary poet Prof. Okot P’ Bitek (RIP). She is a lawyer by training and holds a MBA (entrepreneurship and business venturing). Her love for poetry started way back during her secondary school days where she would compose poetry and plays for the schools talent shows.

Her poetry was nurtured particularly by her beloved Head Mistress Sr. Cormack Cephas, who went as far as declaring that if she did not want to study literature in ‘’A’ levels then she should go to another school. At that time she was interested in sciences with a view to becoming a doctor. However this was one of the best schools in Uganda so the Head Mistress’s wish became her command.

Her greatest inspiration and influence was her father from whom she adopted the ‘song’ style of poetry. She is a published poet, Song of Farewell, and currently has an unpublished manuscript. Her poetry covers political and social issues, especially those that touch human beings and the rhythm of nature.

Jacob Oketch

Kenya No Comments

Jacob Oketch is a poet and a freelance journalist based in Nairobi, Kenya. He has been performing and writing poetry for almost a decade. At the moment,he is preparing to publish his first collection of poetry. He is also in the process of releasing a poetry CD that features other two poets from the East Africa region.

Oketch is a postgraduate student in journalism at the University of Nairobi. He has worked with a number of foreign and local cultural institutions to promote and publicise poetry including Goethe institute Nairobi, Italian institute of Culture Nairobi, and Kwani Trust. He has featured as a backup vocalist in a Kenyan musician’s CD besides also previously featuring in an acapella group. In addition, he has also acted in plays staged by theatre groups in Kenya, most notably the University of Nairobi free travelling theatre. He has written articles for various magazines published in Nairobi.

Gus Ferguson

South Africa No Comments

Gus Ferguson has been writing poetry for the past 20 years and has acted as a publisher of mainly South African poets since 1979.

He has several collections published by a broad range of publishers – his latest collection Holding Pattern was published in 2009.

He is the recipient of a Molteno Silver medal and the English Academy Gold medal, both for services to poetry and as a poet.

Gail Dendy

South Africa No Comments

Gail Dendy has published seven collections of poetry, her most recent being Closer Than That (Johannesburg: Dye Hard Press, 2011). Her first collection, published by Harold Pinter, was Assault and the Moth, Greville Press (UK) 1993. This was followed by People Crossing (Snailpress, 1995), Swimming in the Long Dark Sound (Stride, UK, 1998, Painting the Bamboo Tree (Arc, UK, 1999), The Poetry of Norman Corwin and Gail Dendy (Shirim, USA, 2002), and The Lady Missionary (Kwela/Snailpress, 2007). Her poetry regularly appears in journals and anthologies both in SA and overseas.
Throughout the 1980s and early ’90s Gail pioneered Contemporary Dance in South Africa and was nominated for the inaugural AA Vita Award for Best Performer. In her writing career, she was a Finalist in the South African Science Fiction Society’s Short Story competition, 1992; Finalist, Dalro Award 2007, Winner of the “Playwriting” category, SA PEN Millennium Competition, 2000; and Joint Winner of the cash prize for the Herman Charles Bosman Literary Award, 2008. She has also been long-listed for the Plough Prize (UK, 2008), shortlisted for the Thomas Pringle Award for Prose (Category: Short Story), 2010, and shortlisted for the EU/Sol Plaatje Poetry Prize in both 2011 and 2012.

The most recent anthologies to feature Gail Dendy’s work are: Anthony Astbury (ed) A Field of Large Desires (Manchester: Carcanet, 2010; Liesl Jobson (compiler) The Sol Plaatje/European Union Poetry Anthology 2011 (Cape Town: Jacana, 2011), and Patricia Schonstein Pinnock (ed) Africa, My Africa! (African Sun Press, 2013), and Harry Owen (ed) For Rhino in a Shrinking World: An International Anthology (East London, SA: The Poets Printery, 2013).

Over the years Gail has worked, inter alia, as a university lecturer, copywriter, and radio news writer. She is currently the Information Specialist for an international corporate-law firm.

Gail is passionate about environmental- and animal-rights issues. She lives in Johannesburg together with her husband, pets, a law library, and a collection of ballet, dance, classical, and Rock ‘n Roll CDs and DVDs.

Esther Karin Mngodo

Tanzania No Comments

Known by her stage name Es Taa, Esther Karin Mngodo is a Tanzanian poet based in Dar Es Salaam. At the age of 10 she was encouraged by her mother to join the choir, which she did. As the youngest member at the time, Es Taa started off as a Saprano and later on as an Alto. She recently discovered her Tenor voice in a band that ahe has been part of since 2006. Not only is the 26 year old a poet and a musician, but a journalist, a storyteller, a playwright, a social worker, a song composer and a woman passionate about her faith in God.

In 2011 she co-wrote a Musical Move: The Time is Now that was staged at The National Museum Theatre in Dar Es Salaam. She recently performed her original poems at The Smart Partnership Dialogue Meeting held in Dar es Salaam that was attended by Commonwealth Heads of States and different dignitaries.

Using her own life experience, Es Taa’s passion is to unearth matters that people would rather not talk about openly, to bring healing through authentic lyrics that have been birthed through her own pain, mistakes and the quest of life’s purpose. She also seeks to use art as a tool of social change by addressing issues of human rights and social justice in a way that people can relate to.

Eric Miyeni

South Africa No Comments

Multi-talented writer, poet, actor, media personality Eric Miyeni’s third and latest offering Mandingo! A Poetic Journey with Eric Miyeni, has been described as honest, raw and compelling. It follows the success of O!Mandingo!, The only black at a dinner party and O!Mandingo! Before Mandela was Mandela, which were launched following the phenomenal response to his e-zine. The work of Soweto-born Miyeni centres on black pride, black strength, black unity and black prosperity.

Efe Paul Azino

Nigeria No Comments

Born and raised on the sub-urban streets of Lagos, Efe Paul Azino has evolved a poetry uniquely his own. His poems are welcomed in the realm of academia and acclaimed on the streets.

Widely regarded as one of Nigeria’s leading Spoken Word Poets, Efe Paul has been a headline performer in many of the nation’s premier performance poetry venues, including Anthill 2.0 and Taruwa. For over a decade, Efe has continued to deliver Spoken Word Poetry locally and internationally, gracing platforms at seminars, workshops, conferences, tertiary institutions, community development fora, as well as churches.

Reflecting the sufferings evident in numerous African societies and the hope that keeps them going, Efe Paul’s poems resonate with the high and the low, cutting across social and religious boundaries. His poems are centered on socio-economic and political themes and are enhanced by a strong voice, keeping his audiences entranced for the full length of his performances.

A one-time member of the Editorial Board of The Effective Manager Monthly, pioneer Editor of Mageuzi Magazine and Next Generation, a monthly Newspaper dedicated to raising youth awareness on socio-economic and political issues, Efe Paul is a vital contributor to national discourse and his essays are featured in national and international dailies and journals. A curious student of life, his readings and learning span various disciplines.

The voice of a generation, a seeker and speaker of truth, an entertaining poet and performer, Efe Paul leads a generation of poets in successfully lifting poetry off the printed page, out of the shadows of academia and making it accessible to the people.

Dr Menzi Duka

South Africa No Comments

Dr Menzi Meshach Minsie Duka was born in Cradock on 11th November 1948.

In 1984, Dr Duka completed his first anthology of isiXhosa poetry IBETHO (a song of victory)

In 1996 he established Cradock Writers Association. The Eastern Cape Provincial Arts and Culture Council funded the programmes of this association of which Dr Duka was the leader. Through such funding he produced books such as: Amavo Obuntu (essays), Ubusi (short stories), Imidlalwana Encasa (Three – one – act plays), Isihobe seAfrika Entsha 1 (Anthology of poems), Isihobe seAfrika 2 (Anthology of poems), Iingqwebo Zoluncwadi Lwanamhlanje (analysis of IsiXhosa literature) and Isihobe seAfrika Entsha 3 (An anthology of poems yet to be published).

Some of his poems are in various anthologies such as Intambanane, Umthombo, Vukani Kusile and others.

In 1999, Dr Duka obtained  his Masters Degree with distinction from the  University of South Africa (UNISA). His research was in ZS Qangule’s poetry. Three years later, he obtained a doctorate in Literature and Philosophy from the same university. In his thesis he interpreted and analysed Professor Ncedile Saule’s novels using formalism, structuralism and post – structuralism.

He is the chairperson of Vusubuntu Lodge and Cultural Village (Cradock) and the Cradock Socio-economic transformation Forum in Cradock.  He is also the Senior Pastor of Holy Trinity Ministries and is currently writing Christian books and another anthology of isiXhosa poems.
He also participated in the African Renaissance of South Africa from 2002 to 2010. He was the chairperson of Eastern Cape African Renascence Chapter and a board member of the South African Chapter of African Renaissance. He delivered speeches during some seminars of this movement.

He has also read a paper in the SEK Mqhayi conferenceof 2010. In July 2012 ISER (Rhodes university) summer seminar he also read a paper on the legacy of Matthew Goniwe as well as  many papers on James Arthur Calata and during other occasions organised by the Departments of Arts and Culture. During Grahamstown Wordfest he read some of his IsiXhosa poems and also launched his books.

Currently Dr Duka is an educationist, academic, author of books, community builder and a church leader. He is an inspector of schools, that is, a circuit manager in the Cradock district in the Eastern Cape South Africa.

Dolapo Ogunwale

Nigeria No Comments

Oluwadolapo meaning “The Lord has poured (things of) substance together” is an embodiment of her name. Her poetry speaks of her inner experiences, either thought out or lived through. She writes in the hope that her words connect with another’s inner self and begins a deep inner reflection that will cause lasting change from the individual to the entire world.

Dolapo’s spoken word delivery has been described as theatrical and deeply moving. Applying her background in music, dance and stage acting into her live performances, she does not resemble one who only began this genre of artistry in August, 2010.

Born to yoruba parents as Oluwadolapo Ebunoluwapo Ogunwale in the city of Lagos, she hopes to find listening ears and open hearts on the world stage.

Dami Ajayi

Nigeria No Comments

Dami Ajayi was born in 1986 in Nigeria and has been penning down poems since he was 11. His debut collection of poems, Clinical Blues, which has notoriously remained in manuscript form, was shortlisted for the 2012 Melita Hume Prize. His poems have appeared in several reputable journals in Africa, Europe and America. Dami is also a medical doctor.

Dorian Haarhoff

Namibia No Comments

Dorian Haarhoff (1944- ) a South African/Namibian poet, facilitates creative writing, and story-telling wordshops and acts as a one-on-one writing mentor. In a past life, a Professor of English Literature (Namibia), Dorian now tinkers his trade in the street markets of the world. Mythology, creation spirituality, whole brain theory, the new Physics, narrative therapy, Ubuntu, Eco and Jungian psychology and the poetic tradition influence his writing and work.

Passionate about developing innate creativity and imagination, he believes in the power of poetry to create new realities. He has been participating poet at Poetry Africa, SA and at the International Poetry Festival in Colombia, South America.

Selected publications:

Creative Writing teaching text

The Writer’s Voice: A Workbook for Writers in Africa (Zebra Press, Johannesburg 1998.)

Poetry:

Wrist and Rib (own publication, Cape Town, 1978.)

Stickman (own publication, Windhoek, 1981.)

Bordering (Justified Press, Johannesburg, 1991.)

Aquifers and Dust (Justified Press, Johannesburg, 1994.)

Tortoise Voices (Mercer, Cape Town, 2002.)

Drawing Water (Leopard Press, Durban, 2007.)

Poemegranites (Leopard Press, Durban, 2012.)

Editing of Poetry (Student Writing)

The Writers Eye: Namibian Poetry in Process (ed. D. Haarhoff, Basler Afrika Bibliographien, 1997.)

Drama Scripts:

Goats, Oranges and Skeletons (ed. T. Zeeman, Gamsberg Macmillan, Windhoek, 2002.)

The Missing Namibian, SAMP – (Swedish African Museum Project) performed in Sweden and Namibia , 1996 (unpublished.)

Children’s Stories/ Drama:

Desert December (Songololo, Cape Town, 1991, Clarion, New York, 1992 and Pan Macmillan, U.K., 1993.)

Water from the Rock (New Namibia Books, Windhoek, 1992.)

Legs, Bones and Eyes (New Namibia Books, Windhoek 1994, Puffin, 1996.)

Guano Girl (Justified Press, Johannesburg, 1994.)

Space Racer, graded reader (Kagiso, Cape Town, 1996.)

Grandfather’s Enoch’s Pipe, graded reader (Gamsberg Macmillan, Windhoek, 2002.)

The Water Diviner, short list top 3 African Baobab competition 2011

Alice in Welwitschialand (Environmental Play) Performed 1992, 1993 and 1994 NTN (National Theatre Namibia) and Grahamstown Festival. (unpublished)

The Colour of Water, Children’s Radio Drama Serial. Namibian B C, 1993.

D’bi Young

Canada Jamaica No Comments

born in kingston jamaica, raised in whitfield town
birthed from the womb of dub
by anita (poets iin unity) stewart
who raised her child
at orality’s hub
storyteller d’bi.young takes performance live
is celebrated by the people on her way
including receiving two doras for blood.claat
first of the sankofa trio of plays
the second and third are benu and word! sound! powah!
onewomban biomyth monodramas
d’bi. is dubpoet, educator, soul-searching wombanist
also aspiring rawfoodist
played staceyann in da kink in my hair
founded anitafrika! dub theatre
recorded six dub disks
with two collections of poetry published
new album set to blossom late 2010
watching her two sons grow
while currently touring the world

Checkmate Mido

Kenya No Comments

The ever-resilient Checkmate Mido is a human beatbox, poet, musician and actor. He is known for his thought provoking poems and incorporating beatboxing into his performances.

In December 2010, at the annual Kenya Music Week, held at the Sarit Centre, he co-released his 6 track EP called Broken City with Kennah as his first foray into recording an album, which apart from the two, features various artists such as world renowned percussionist Tenpar Tella.

Broken City was again relaunched at the secrets lounge on the 3rd of March 2011. http://nairobinow.wordpress.com/concertalbum-launch-kennah-checkmate-live-unplugged-mar-3-2011-secrets-lounge/

Apart from writing his own music and poetry, he had a hugely successful debut as an actor appearing in the popular play Mayors’ Diary performed by Ethnic Productions in collaboration with Adcents media (now Kilele Productions), in which he starred as the title character the Mayor. He also played a role in the thriller Death & The Estate (as Spencer-The Family Lawyer) staged at the Kenya National Theatre from 9th-11th December 2011.

He featured in the 2012 edition of The Theatre Company’s Fire By Ten series playing multiple roles.

Having featured in festivals such as Wapi (words and pictures) in 2011 and Kinanda Arts Festival he has performed at various other poetry nights such as Slam Africa, Kwani and Wamathai.

Crystal Tettey

Ghana No Comments

Crystal Tettey is a Malagasy/Ghanaian artist who is a member of EhaLaKasa- a group of young Spoken word poets who use performance art to inspire positive social change. She is fluent in English, French, Russian, Ga and Twi.

Chenjerai Hove

Zimbabwe No Comments

Chenjerai Hove born February 9, 1956, he is a Zimbabwean poet, novelist and essayist. He was educated at the University of South Africa and the University of Zimbabwe, and has worked as an educator and journalist. He has lived in exile since 2001, after his writings, especially Masimba Avanhu and a play, Sister, Sing Again Someday (both of which address the situation of women in Zimbabwe), as well as his criticism of the policies of President Robert Mugabe, brought him to the attention of the Zimbabwe government.

He currently lives in exile as the International Writers Project fellow in residence at Brown University’s Watson Institute for International Studies. Widely regarded as a leading figure of post-colonial Zimbabwean literature, Chenjerai Hove is the author of four novels – Bones, Shadows, Ancestors, and, in his native Shona, Masimba Avanhu (Is This the People’s Power?), as well as of three volumes of poetry, books of essays, and freelance journalism.

Helen Moffett

South Africa No Comments

Helen Moffett is a freelance writer, editor, academic and poet, whose lectured as far afield as Trinidad and Alaska. Her academic writings include a great deal of gloomy but necessary work on sexual violence in the post-apartheid context. She writes about cricket because it reminds her why she likes men (and because she loves the game with a passion).

She has also published a university textbook on poetry, an anthology of South African landscape writing and several short stories. Poetry is her first and last love, she went from teaching it to students to eventually writing her own. Her debut collection of poems, Strange Fruit, was published by Modjaji Books in 2009.

Hannah Lurie

South Africa No Comments
Hannah Lurie is a sculptor. She has had over 15 solo exhibitions (including jewellery). She has been commissioned for many public works, including the portrait busts of poet Douglas Livingstone and Professor Elizabeth Sneddon at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre. She works on tiny scale for jewellery to a commissioned project, last year, of two figures three metres high entitled Uxolo (Peace).
Lurie has won the Waterman Prize for poetry as well as the Adams Book Shop Prize. She was awarded the Mariette Loots Award for her book I’m too Sexy for My Hair, of which 260 000 copies have been printed so far by sponsors, and which are available at the Cancer Association and Parklands Oncology unit free of charge. The volume deals with the defeat of breast cancer.
She is Honorary Life Vice-President of the KwaZulu-Natal Society of Arts and Past National President of Soroptimist International of Great Britain & Ireland, in Durban, the biggest women’s service organisation in the world.

 

Hugh Hodge

South Africa No Comments

Hugh is a Baby Boomer Brat. He was born in 1946 on Nelson Mandela’s 28th birthday (Hugh’s closest brush with fame) at Tavistock in Devon, England. Rondebosch Boys’ High attempted to educate Hugh without much success. Later, Essex University endured similar disappointments, but got over them.

He has (had) three wives, and three children. Each marriage was happy in its own way and in its own time. The children are more beautiful than he expected. Hugh has had a job as a small, and sometimes negative, contributor to the technological revolution. He also produced bug-free code, but very rarely.

Despite being commonly left-brained, and occasionally no-brained, Hugh writes poetry that is sometimes published. He attends the Off-the-Wall poetry gig Mondays in Obz, and hosts monthly gigs in Kalk Bay and Kommetjie. He edits New Contrast. And, aside from a natural tribal arrogance, he is kind and tolerant, even of dogs.

Hale Tsehlana

Lesotho No Comments

Hale Tsehlana is the Faculty Advisor for the Stellenbosch University Poetry Society, which she assisted to establish. She is a published poet and has read and performed her poetry in and around South Africa, India, Germany, UK and South Korea. Her collection titled Poems and Songs from the Mirea was relaunched in August 2007 at a special celebration for the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions hosted by the South Africa National Library for the Blind in Grahamstown and it has been published in Braille and Audio. In the face of current debates on multiculturalism and multilingualism in South Africa, this book takes a multimedia and multilingual approach to poetry with English, Afrikaans and Sesotho poems. The book encourages local writers to reach out to marginalized communities who may not be able to read and write; hence it is made into Braille.

She recently translated a children’s book Phapo’s Gift that will be suitable for use in primary schools. She is featured in Ink@ boilingpoint, a collection of poems and essays by women from the Southern tip of Africa, (2004) 2nd edition. Voices from the Free State (2004), an anthology of Prose, Verse & Creative Articles by Indigenous Women and Youth of the Free State Province, and Basadzi Voices, an anthology of poetic writing by young black South African Women, published in 2006 by University of KwaZulu-Natal Press. Hale Tsehlana was selected to attend the November 2007 Asia Africa Literature Festival in Jeonju South Korea and in May 2008 she represented South Africa as one of the 20 young writers selected world wide to participate in the Seoul Young Writers Festival. In 2009, she presented the Words on Water Festival – Stellenbosch Satellite event sponsored & co-hosted by the by the Indian Consulate Cape Town Office & Stellenbosch International office.

Haidee Kruger

South Africa No Comments

Haidee Kruger is associate professor in the School of Languages at the Vaal Triangle Campus of North-West University in South Africa. She holds a PhD in translation studies, and is primarily involved in research in descriptive and theoretical translation studies. Her most recent research publication is Postcolonial polysystems: The production and reception of translated children’s literature in South Africa (John Benjamins, 2012).

Her poetry and short stories have been published in, amongst others, The Common, Big Bridge, New Contrast, New Coin and Green Dragon. Her debut collection of poetry, Lush: poems for four voices, was published in 2007 by Protea Book House. Lush was praised in the judges statement for the 2006/2007 Ingrid Jonker Prize as an “innovative volume of poems” that was “a close contender for the prize”. The reckless sleeper (Modjaji Books, 2012) is her second collection.

Kruger lives in Vereeniging, South Africa, with her husband and three children.

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Azila Talit Reisenberger

South Africa No Comments

Azila Talit Reisenberger is an award winning author who has had poetry, short stories and a novel published in Israel, the USA, UK, Germany and South Africa.

Two of her plays: Adam’s Apple and The loving father, were staged at the Grahamstown Festival.

She heads the Hebrew section in the School of Languages and Literatures at the University of Cape Town, and renowned for her passionate lectures and articles on gender issues and feminist theology in the Bible. Since 1990 she has served as the Rabbi of Temple Hillel, a progressive Jewish community in East London. She lives in Cape Town with her husband and three children.

Antjie Krog

South Africa No Comments

Antjie Krog was born and grew up in the Free State. She became editor of the Afrikaans current-affairs magazine Die Suid-Afrikaan and later worked as a radio journalist covering the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings, all the while writing extensively for newspapers and journals. She and her radio colleagues received the Pringle Award for excellence in journalism for their coverage of the Commission hearings, from which came the best known of her three non-fiction books, Country of My Skull.

She has won major awards in almost all the genres and media in which she has worked: poetry, non-fiction and translation. But, mainly, she has lived as a poet. Krog’s first volume of poetry was published when she was seven­teen years old and she has since released thirteen volumes of poetry and received among others the Eugène Marais Prize, the Hertzog Prize, the FNB Prize, the Protea Prize, and, for non-fiction, the Alan Paton Prize and the Olive Schreiner Award. She has also been a recipient of the Stockholm Award from the Hiroshima Foundation for Peace and Culture and the Open Society Prize. She is married to architect John Samuel.

Anne Moraa

Kenya No Comments

Anne Moraa is first and foremost a writer. A powerful spoken word artist, she has won several competions (Slam Africa, Kwani Open Mic) and has performed pieces at major festivals (Kwani Litfest, StoryMoja Hay Festival).

Her strong feminist perspective and willingness to challenge norms led to commissioned performances on gender and sexuality, including the 2013 “Festivale CulturElles” at Alliance Francaise. A law graduate, she writes fiction prose as well as scripts, social commentary and basically anything she can get her hands on.

Anis Mojgani

United States No Comments

Anis Mojgani is a two time National Poetry Slam Champion and winner of the International World Cup Poetry Slam. A TEDx Speaker and former resident of the Oregon Literary Arts Writers-In-The-Schools program, Anis has performed at numerous universities, festivals, and venues around the globe and has performed for audiences as varied as the House of Blues and the United Nations. His work has appeared on HBO, NPR, and in the pages of such journals as Rattle, Forklift Ohio, Used Furniture Review, and Thrush.

A founding member of the touring Poetry Revival, Anis is also the author of three poetry collections, all published by Write Bloody Publishing: Songs From Under the River (2013), The Feather Room (2011), and Over the Anvil We Stretch (2008). A graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design, he still tries to make tiny spaces for visual art, doing the covers for his own books, and occasionally providing work for others, be it illustrations, the random poster, or whatever else may spark up. Originally from New Orleans, Anis currently lives in Austin TX in a little house with his wife and their dog, Trudy.

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Anele

South Africa No Comments

Anele is a 28 year old poet raised in East London, South Africa but now based in Cape Town. Dead Prez and Tupac Shakur have been his main inspiration throughout his career.

Anele is well known for his witty poetry recited in his mother tongue Xhosa. He has been performing with Lingua Franca since its first Naked Word Poetry Session. In 2013 he performed at the Zabalaza Mini festivals, and he was a headlining act with Lingua Franca during the Naked Slam Poetry 2013. Anele is also part of a Floetry project run by Nanziwe Mzuzu under Bozza.mobi. He won the Cape Town leg of DFL Lover + Another Poetry Challenge in 2013 and was placed fourth at the Nationals.

In 2012 he wrote and performed a poetry production called People from no People at the Black Box Theatre in Delft.

Adjei Agyei Baah

Ghana No Comments

Adjei Agyei Baah is a Strategic Management Lecturer of University College of Management Studies, Kumasi and a Co-founder of Poetry Foundation Ghana.

His poems have been published in many anthologies such as Sun And Snow [Canada, 2010], We Come From One Place [2010, Mensa Press], Whispers in the Whirlwind [2010, Mensa Press] and had also been published in haiku sites such as Shamrock.

Ama Nuamah

Ghana No Comments

Ama is a young lady born and based in Accra, Ghana. She loves other creative disciplines but writing is a deeply-rooted passion of hers. Writing is her safe haven, writing is her lifeline.