JUDGES ANNOUNCEMENT: NIGERIAN NEWSDIRECT POETRY PRIZE 2020

So far, we have received over 480 unique entries and are gearing up to the next phase. For the inaugural prize, we are excited to announce that the judges are Servio Gbadamosi and Oyindamola Shoola. Two poets, who in time past, have been featured in our Poetry Column.

Poet and publisher, Servio Gbadamosi, is a recipient of the 2016 Ebedi International Writers Residency fellowship where he co-wrote the chapbook, A Half-Formed Thing with fellow residents, Ehi’zogieIyeoman and IkechukwuNwaogu. His poetry collection, A Tributary in Servitude, won the 2015 Association of Nigerian Authors’ Prize for Poetry, and was shortlisted runner-up for the 2018 Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa.

Gbadamosi’s works have appeared online as well as in journals, newspapers and anthologies such as ANA Review 2017, ANA Review 2018, ANA Review 2019, Crossroads: Anthology of Poems in Honour of Christopher Okigbo, Fela’s Re-arrangement: A Collage of the Poetic Biography of Nigeria’s Folkhero of Afrobeat Music and The Sky is Our Earth: Anthology of Fifty Young Nigerian Poets. He coedited the poetry collections; The Promise this Time was Not a Flood: A Sevhage Anthology of Flood Poems and Salt of the Heart: Anthology of Poems for Nigeria at 50.

He currently heads Noirledge Publishing, an independent publishing house with a focus on mainstreaming a generation of new voices in contemporary Nigerian writing.

Oyindamola Shoola is a writer, author, and feminist. She is also the Co-founder of SprinNG, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting Nigerian writers.

Oyindamola graduated from Bronx Community College in 2017 and the New York University in 2020 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Organizational Behavior and Change.

An award-winning leader, writer, and student (of life) – she coaches others to enhance their career development and academic success experiences.

The submission window remains open till January 25, 2021. Read the guidelines here.