On the BTA/AngloPlatinum Short Story Contest website it says that, sadly, this year will be the last year the contest will be run. No further details are given. Perhaps AngloPlatinum is planning to find another way to support writers and we will see a re-vamped contest much like SA/PEN did this year. Let’s cross our fingers!
The contest has been running since 1994 with over 15,000 entries from all over the SADC region. I, personally, must thank both AngloPlatinum and Beulah Thumbadoo and her staff as I was one of the recipients of the contest having won last year’s first prize and the Platinum Prize for Creativity for my story “The Christmas Wedding”. The win has been an important push to my career, and I hope it will do the same for this year’s winners.
This year’s winners were a culturally diverse and exciting group. In first and fourth place was author of So You Want to be an Au Pair in the USA, Cynthia Jele. Her story “Finding Joe” scooped the R25,000 first prize, while another one of her stories, “The Art of Formation” won fourth prize. “Finding Joe” is set in rural KwaZulu-Natal and is about a young girl’s quest to find her estranged father.
Zimbabwean film maker and former director of the Zimbabwean International Film Festival, Rumbi Katzeda, scooped second place with “Billboard Smile” about a young girl trying to make her way through the rough streets of Harare.
Third place went to Jabulani Welcome Mzimela for “Called to the Cross”, while the Platinum Prize for Creativity, which is a piece of platinum jewellery, went to Natasha Moodley for “Kaserne City”.
Congratulations to all of the winners!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment