Caine Prize Award for African Writing Annual Literary Award

The Caine Prize Award for African Writing is an annual literary award that recognizes published short stories by African writers. The award is named after the late Sir Michael Caine, who was the Chairman of Booker plc and also chaired the ‘Africa 95’ arts festival in Europe and Africa in 1995. The award comprises a prize of £10,000 and was established by friends and colleagues of Sir Michael Caine to be awarded annually in his memory.

Winners of the Caine Prize Award and shortlisted writers are invited to participate in events in Africa, London, and other locations if circumstances and resources permit. In these cases, each of the shortlisted candidates will be granted a travel award.

To be eligible for the prize, the story must have been published in the five years preceding the submission deadline. The judges will only consider work published between 1st April 2019 and 25th March 2024 for the 2024 eligibility. The entry must be more than 3,000 words or less than 10,000 words, and submissions must be made by a publisher. This includes publishers of physical and digital books, literary journals, magazines, and arts-oriented websites. Furthermore, the writer must be over 18 years of age at the time of submission. Self-published and unpublished short stories are not eligible, and publishers are encouraged to submit multiple short stories as long as they do not submit more than one story by the same author.

Genres not eligible for entry include novels, children’s stories, factual writing, academic essays, plays, poetry, autobiography/biography, and any work that does not constitute a fictional short story. Submissions must specify which African country the author comes from and the short story’s word count. The publisher’s letter should include the name of the writer(s), title of the story or stories being submitted, word count of each submitted story, qualifying nationality of the writer(s), and the date of publication of the story or stories. Confirmation of consent from the writer(s) whose stories are being submitted for the Prize is also required.

To submit an entry, each story must be submitted by the publisher via email as a PDF attachment or via a link to the story (if it has been published online). The subject matter of the email should be ‘The Caine Prize for African Writing Entry for 2024.’ Submissions that do not meet the above criteria will not be eligible for the prize. The application deadline is March 31, 2024. If you have any questions or queries regarding our eligibility criteria, please email [email protected], and we will be happy to assist!