The Commonwealth Short Story Prize 2023 has been won by Jamaican writer Kwame McPherson, for his story Ocoee, about a driver in a Floridian town who is pulled over by the police in an encounter that unravels the history of his home and life.
McPherson was the regional winner of the Caribbean last month, and won out of 6,641 entrants. He will receive a cash prize of £5,000.
On his win, he said, “When I began my writing journal it was not a conscious decision, it was just something I enjoyed doing… Having the ability to provoke thought, interest or move a reader from one mental and emotional state to the next, is a skill within itself and one I have been blessedly bestowed with and do not take for granted.”
The jury consists of writers and editors from five continental regions, including Pakistani writer Bilal Tanweer (chairperson, Asia), Rémy Ngamije (Africa), Ameena Hussein (Asia), Katrina Best (Canada and Europe), Mac Donald Dixon (Caribbean) and Selina Tusitala Marsh (Pacific).On Ocoee, an exploration of the African diasporic experience in the Caribbean with a touch of regional folklore, Tanweer said, “[It] forces a reckoning with the challenge that confronts all writers in the postcolonial world: how to write about a world that has been destroyed without any traces.”
Indian writer Vidhan Verma made it to the shortlist for his story A Groom like Shahrukh, but missed out to Singapore’s Agnes Chew, who became the regional winner of Asia.
Other regional winners, all of whom won a cash prize of £2,500, are as follows: Hana Gammon (South Africa, Africa), Himali McInnes (New Zealand, Pacific, and Rue Baldry (United Kingdom, Canada and Europe).The 2020 edition of the annual award of short fiction went to India’s Kritika Pandey, for her story The Great Indian Tee and Snakes. The 2024 prize will open for submissions on September 1 and will also accept entries in Bengali, Chinese, Swahili and Tamil — the winning entry, if in one of these languages, will be translated to English.
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