About
Ola Awonubi:
Short Bio
Ola
Awonubi was born in London to Nigerian parents and grew up in Nigeria. She has
won two writing awards and is currently
working on a collection of short stories.
My interest in writing started as a
child. I have
always had a vivid imagination and used to make up stories in my head when I
was a kid. I remember being around five years old when I used take my Ladybird
and Enid Blyton books and write short stories around them with black characters
because although I liked the books, I could not identify with them as a young
black child growing up in seventies England.
When I
returned to England after studying in Nigeria, I went on to spend three years taking intermediate and advanced writing
courses at the Centerprise Literature Development project in Hackney before
studying for an MA in Creative writing and Imaginative Practice at the
University of East London.
A wide
range of themes influence my writing . I would say I try to write about
Universal themes really things that people any where in the world can identify
with. Family, love, relationships are a particular interest. For my thesis for
my MA in Creative writing - my collection of short stories was about how
colonialism had changed African society, culture and relationships.
In 2008 and 2009 respectively, I won
two prizes; one for my short story 'The Pink House' in the National Words of
Colour competition, the other, 'The Go-Slow Journey' for the Wasafiri New
Writing Prize in the fiction category.
It was
really exciting and fulfilling to win the competitions. Since then I have had
two stories accepted in anthologies - the Naijastories anthology and another
one has been accepted in Storytime.
Other short stories have been published on African writing.com, StoryTime,
Faithtowrite.com and naijastories.com sites and I have been interviewed by
Words of Colour and Amina magazine.
I found the experience of completing an
MA very helpful,
instructive and enlightening. I particularly liked the peer feedback which was
part of the course - where we would complete some assignments and learn to
constructively critique each others work in front of the lecturer. We were not
allowed to just say - I like it or I hate it - you had to describe it using the
technicalities i.e. the use of symbolism, or metaphors or point of view in
order to give advice about how the piece of work could improve etc. It was a
chance to network, and make contacts but I have found that an MA is good but
most of the hard work begins after it finishes.
Im currently
working on a collection of short stories based on the African experience, and
have has a romantic novel accepted for publication by Ankara press - an imprint
of Cassava press in Abuja Nigeria. I
have also just finished the first draft of another novel about domestic
violence. I always look out for short story competitions I can submit my
entries to such as Bridport, Mslexia, Short Story prize and the Commonwealth
writers prize to mention a few.
Currently
working on a WW2 period romance and would love to write a screenplay one day. I
have a story I am trying to find time to develop
Links
to publications ;
'The
Go Slow Journey' , winner 1st prize in the Wasafiri International Writing
Competition 2009. Published in the Wasafiri Journal Issue No 61 Spring 2010
'The
Pink House' winner 1st prize in the Words of Colour writing competition 2008
Short
story - Illusion of Dreams published in Naija
Stories - Of Tears and Kisses, Heroes and Villains - An Anthology of Short
fiction from Nigeria.
Website:
http://www.olaawonubi.com/
Blog:
Olawritesfiction on Wordpress
Facebook:
Olawritesfiction
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