Judging the Caine Prize

Granta’s deputy editor Ellah Allfrey was one of the judges for the Caine Prize for African Writing – awarded last night to Olufemi Terry of Sierra Leone for his story ‘Stickfighting Days’ . Here, she reflects on the range and richness of the stories entered for a competition with a remit the size of a continent...

I spent the weekend reading, re-reading stories from Kenya, Sierra Leone, South Africa and Zambia. In one a young girl navigates a drunken weekend barbecue, tumbling from one world (expats in the garden slowly sinking into their gin under the heat of an African sun), to the forbidden compound at the bottom of the garden. In another, Jesuit priests in a desert outpost are confronted with unexpected violence. The third was an intense, brutal retelling of an 18th century love affair. And there was the tale of a dying oak tree, a dog called Worm and an owner demented by paranoia and fear. Finally, there was the story of boys who go to battle wielding sticks with names inspired by Tolkien’s Middle Earth.

The stories shortlisted for this year’s Caine Prize for African Writing challenge any attempt at easy categorisation. Evenly matched in ambition, spread across four countries (more if one takes into account the writers’ peripatetic lives), and fiercely original – this is writing that takes the continent as its setting and faces the whole wide world with bold assurance.

When we got together at Exeter College to choose the winner yesterday afternoon, we spent over two hours discussing these stories. Where were the flaws? Which stories stood up to a third, fourth reading? In the end, the chair gave us ten points and told us to award them to the top three stories. The winning story (about the stick fighting boys) was at the top of everyone’s list. With confidence, skill and craft evident in each story we considered, this vividly imagined, tightly focused tale of boys alone – there are no parents, no families here – the world they create, and the complex rules of life of death had an ambition that took it well beyond its setting. ‘Stickfighting Days’ shouts out a talent that deserves a wide audience … and in its eleventh year, the Caine Prize promises just that.

President of the Council Baroness Nicholson (middle), with shortlisted candidates Lily Mabura, Ken Barris, Olufemi Terry, Alex Smith, Namwali Serpall

Visit the Caine Prize website