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my poem "the anatomy of rust" is live on @thestripesmag.
stripesliterarymagazine.weebly.com/felixeshiet.ht…
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Felix Eshiet
2.5K posts
Felix Eshiet
@gwriting_plug
writer & efik-ibibio poet. works in: @ChestnutReview, @onlypoemsmag, @madridlitmag, @20_35Africa, @PorterHouseLit, eic @ekondoreview
Nigeria เข้าร่วม Şubat 2021
1.3K กำลังติดตาม577 ผู้ติดตาม
Indonesia
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Few days ago, I was announced in the shortlist for the Evaristo prize for African Poetry. I am still wrapping my head around the idea of being a next Gen poet. April has been beautiful. I have poems forthcoming on @brackenmagazine, Splinter Journal & Sunlight Press. I will be
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as a young writer, make it a habit to document your life: take pictures of the blue moments & the yellow phases. someday, you'd be glad you did
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I think you have to be a bit crazy to be a writer.
I mean: I may well spend the next few years of my life writing something that, ultimately, is crap and simply not worth reading. 🤷♂️
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@AugustineMacky @onetruechap where's the lie? are you done chasing the bag that you'd have time to worry about being bodyshamed?
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@onetruechap in male circles, our deficiencies actually identify us
If you're fat — biggie, orobo, fatti, biggest
Slim or small — slim daddy, obele, smallie
We even have fun names for bald dudes too and it's all fun
Na una dey overthink these things
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@gwriting_plug @Lolwe_ @EvergreenReview @UbwaliLitMag I'll try but the difficulty is the feeling that for the first time ever I cannot build another book because this one wants to go out first. The book itself is not allowing me 😅
Thanks brother, I'll definitely keep submitting it🤗
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I believe in this manuscript so much that I find myself unable to move away from it. Almost all the poems in there have now been published in @Lolwe_ , @EvergreenReview, @UbwaliLitMag and one won the Gbemisola Adeoti prize 2025.
Just needs a publisher that sees what I see🤲
LUMInescence@ademindpoems
On the topic of rejjies, a rejection for this manuscript just came in now. But nah, I'm too convinced at this point, we go again 😅
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@gwriting_plug Just an announcement style, especially when the winner and shortlist are announced in quick succession. In some cases, you will see a long list comprising of A - H; shortlist: I - L; winner: M.
Palette sometimes adopts this style: palettepoetry.com/2026/02/18/202…
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contrary to what's consistent with the prize's shortlist and winner announcements for, at least the past 3 years (2023—2025), the winner of the 2026 evaristo prize never appeared on the shortlist. can someone please explain what's going on? i'm lost
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@ChideraHarry @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 now you're talking. oya, is the group still active, do you mind inviting me?
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@gwriting_plug @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 More than you can imagine, I am very conscious of that problem.
I have been worried about our poetry. Our fiction is well-read by Nigerians. But our poetry?
In fact I created a WhatsApp group for reviews, for interpretative analysis of contemporary Nigerian poetry.
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Advocate for African literatures. You need a text for a presentation? A short story, a poem for craft discussion or for writing a paper? Leave Shakespeare and Plath alone. Lovely writers no doubt; however, you can (need to) have intellectual conversations with African literature!
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don't beat yourself up. your point was sky-clear. it's not your fault it couldn't be interpreted to mean what you meant
Ariella_Damilola MA@OyedejiDamilol5
Can someone please come and explain to these CS that by saying "Leave Shakespeare and Plath alone" I did not mean "do not read them" and that the statement should be understood together with its preceeding statements? 😅
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@ChideraHarry @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 it's fine if you don't know imbuga. what you read is your choice but can you at least see the angle dami was coming from now? that it's a problem we should be conscious about righting?
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@gwriting_plug @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 I knew it would come to this. But I knew Imbuga. Only as a name. Seen the Animata title. Kenyan, yes. Yet I don't know him. That is where my knowledge of him ends.
Since the last five years I have been a very selective reader.
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@ChideraHarry @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 we sabi the systematic problems & would address them when need be, this one no follow. what's the excuse? the overabundance of western literature over african literature? it's a mindset problem, chidera. when that battle is won, then the problem of availability can be tabled.
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@gwriting_plug @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 The mind cannot produce something different from what it comsumes.
Your point is valid. Westwardness of Nigerian writers. But the problem is systematic.
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@ChideraHarry @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 why would you know francis imbuga? i mean he's not some canonized english playwright, why is he worth knowing?
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@gwriting_plug @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 I don't know Imbuga either.
Okay. My point was clear. Her statement was indirectly insinuating a replacement of Shakespeare and Plath, which hints at the question of local aternatives.
I was barely proffering a solution.
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@ChideraHarry @onwearinzepius @OyedejiDamilol5 sidelining? you know what, i'll pull the plug at this point 'cause her point was very clear and i concur because it's actually a problem i've noticed with so many contemporary writers. forget their writing and come down to their literary mindset: very westward
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@onwearinzepius @gwriting_plug @OyedejiDamilol5 Exactly. How come sidelining is now an act of balance?
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i read pound, kipling, shakespeare, wordsworth, t.s eliot, milton, wordsworth, keats, anne sexton, frost..as much as i read okigbo, achebe, soyinka, senghor, j.p clark, kofi awoonor, kwame dawes, osundare...the watchword is "balance". it does something to your literary worldview
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@onwearinzepius @ChideraHarry @OyedejiDamilol5 you're missing the point. she's calling for a balance in what we read. & yes, most of us, our reading is too westward. spoke to a contemporary writer earlier today & she never heard about francis imbuga or ngugi wa thiong'o but could list over 20 non-african playwrights/writers
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@ChideraHarry @OyedejiDamilol5 I'm totally ok with that, but not to say the person doing so should leave "Shakespeare alone" as though African literature can't be measured up to that when being promoted.
What literature do you think the people you mentioned read to be so good?
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