Ellah Allfrey, the deputy editor of the excellent Granta magazine. on being a judge of the Caine Prize, a British-based prize for African writers:

“… How can one prize possibly claim to assess the literary output of a continent of over 991 million people and its diaspora? Is there any such thing as an “African writer”? Does the very existence of the prize encourage a continued inclination to ghettoisation of these writers and their work? Surely we’ve come far enough that Africans no longer need (if they ever have) the special consideration this categorisation implies?”

BTW, the shortlisted writers are Ken Barris, Lily Mabura, Terry Olufemi, Namwali Serpell and Alex Smith.

h/t Naijablog.