Crossing Borders Magazine

Hannah Griffiths has worked at Faber for two and a half years. Her authors include Rachel Cusk, Miriam Toews, Barbara Kingsolver, Mavis Cheekh and Lorrie Moore.

Download 'What an Editor Does'

Biography:

Phillip Chidavaenzi (26) is a qualified journalist and works at a Features Editor with one of Zimbabwe’s weekly newspapers, The Sunday Mirror. Writing has become an intrinsic part of his life. His debut novel – The Haunted Trail – is set to be published by Longman Zimbabwe. Having been influenced by Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Charles Mungoshi, his writing is however an attempt to capture human relationships from different angles.

Realism and Christianity are the major influences of his literary works, which are basically an attempt to reflect and capture the society he lives in.
Some of his short stories have been published in Zimbabwean newspapers and magazines like The Parade (now defunct) and Moto.

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

It was on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, the last day of February 2006. I was on a routine mail-checking exercise. I nonchalantly opened the sole mail in the mailbox and upon realisation it was from Pippa, I momentarily held my heart in my hands – had I succeeded or failed? Seconds later I was elated. 'I am delighted to let you know that once again your submission has been successful!' Pippa had written. I felt so honoured that I was successful for a second time, after the first story – ‘A Father’s Homecoming’ – had also made it earlier into the second issue of the magazine.

All this has made me appreciate the importance of his writings not only to myself, but to other people as well. This recognition is very special to me. I’m so grateful to Catherine Johnson for a great and incisive mentoring experience. I’m sure she loves this story more than any other I had written.

Download 'The Ties that Bind'

Biography:

Ifeanyi Ajaegbo is a writer and Culture and Development practioner. He is the Executive Director of Youth Now! (The Centre for Integrated Youth Development) an NGO working with youth in the Niger Delta. He is also the founding secretary of the Society for Relevant Art and Culture (SORAC), an art and culture development group in Port Harcourt Rivers State.

His work has appeared in journals such as Okike and he is the winner of the African Regional Prize 2005 Commonwealthy Short Story Competition.

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

I was quite glad to learn that my story will appear in the magazine. For me, it means that I just added another feather to my literary cap. It also means to try achieving better and higher.

Download 'Coming Home'

Biography:

Oluwakemi D. Durojaiye was born in London, England in 1982. She was, however, raised from the age of seven, in Lagos, Nigeria. She studied Cell Biology and Genetics at the University of Lagos and was a member of the Pen Circle, an association of young writers of which Ayodele Arigbabu was once president. Although 'Kemi’s first love was poetry she joined the Crossing Border's project as a writer of fiction. Prior to Crossing Borders the only story she'd ever written was during the British Council's 'Telling Stories' project. Her story The Long Walk Home was subsequently published in an anthology of the stories produced during the project.

'Kemi does not consider herself to be an 'African Writer' but rather a writer who is African. She currently lives and works as a Web developer in London while preparing for a masters in psychology. 

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

My reaction to the news was pure surprise. I told my sister and she joked, rather good-humoredly, that I must be the only one sending in stories. I laughed because the thought had crossed my mind and i do feel like i haven't devoted as much time to improving my writing as I should. I must say, that at this busy and chaotic time in my life, Crossing Borders is among the few things that still keeps me writing and I'm grateful to all the people involved in the scheme. Most of all I'm extremely grateful to my Crossing Borders mentor Linda Cracknell. Now each time I write a short story I wonder 'what would Linda think' or 'what would she suggest'. I believe her advice and mentoring have made me a better writer.

Download 'The Burning Man'

Biography:

Adrian Ashley was born in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe in 1978. He grew up there and nurtured his interest for writing in that city's venerable public library. Each day he edges closer to taking a creative writing degree with the University of South Africa. By day he sells freight to penny-pinching small traders in Blantyre, Malawi, where he now lives. By night he strikes a few keys, trying his best to extract meaning from the events that play out around him. He is sure he will write a novel one day. That will make him proud.

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

There is nothing like sighting an important-looking email subject among the dross of your daily work messages. The message title confirming the acceptance of my story glinted like a fleck of gold among the banal silt that makes up the daily litany of pre-alerts and reminders that gather in my inbox, demanding my attention. Like gold, I admired the message over and over and then tucked it away in a secret folder hidden at the bottom of my email consol. Like gold, I surreptitiously open the message from time to time and laugh a deep throaty laugh.

Download 'The Farewell Party'

Biography:

Born and raised in the Eastlands area of Nairobi, Kenya, 26 year old Matano Lipuka has been dabbling in the creative field ever since he knew how to say M-A-T-A-N-O correctly. He'd be involved with anything to do with the Arts, from singing to acting to writing poetic scrolls to his peers, from Primary through to High school.

Seeking to find himself, he dabbled in the Engineering field for a while but felt that he didn't belong so he went back to the Arts.
Matano Lipuka is currently doing his finishing touches to a collection of short stories - yet to be titled, and is also working on a novella titled 'Faceless Indulgences'.

Apart from 'My first Pay Check', which has been published in the Crossing Borders magazine Issue 2, some of his other works can be found online.

His desire is to see the world united and to see Africans develop a reading culture and his plan is to transcend all boundaries through his writing and give a message of hope, especially to the youth.

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

Now this one really made my day. See, I usually had this strong belief that nobody ever wins twice, but to me this is really awesome. Add that to the fact that I had written the story in a single day on my notebook, soon after I'd just seen the 9:00 pm news, and the following day I decided to type it out onto the computer, and I practically forgot all about it. Then when I saw your offer for multiple submissions I decided to give it a go.

So when you later said that you had accepted it, all I could do was clench my fist and show a thumbs up to the machine. This time I did not even want to say anything to anyone, yet there were three more Crossing Borders participants next to me. I just stared blankly at the screen, tapping at the table... and I logged off and went home.

Please allow me to thank my previous mentor, Michelene Wandor and my current one, Ed Jones, for moulding me into what I am yet to become - one of the greatest writers from Kenya - and to also thank you all at C.B. magazine for giving us an opportunity to showcase our works.

Download 'Heading Home'

Biography:

I was born in New Zealand and grew up there but I’ve lived in Zimbabwe most of the time since 1987. I don’t travel outside Zimbabwe all that often and even less often outside Southern Africa, so I feel as though this is really my context. I work as a freelance consultant, writing workshop and conference reports, editing and doing book production. As a result, I’m writing or dealing with written material all the time and there’s a level on which I’d like to bring poetry to, say, a report on global trade or ‘gender responsive budgeting’. Certainly it works the other way – the issues that I work with do find their way into my poetry and other creative writing.

I also have a contemporary dance company and I’m interested in ways of bringing writing and dance together to see how they can complement or bounce off each other.

Reaction to being published in Issue 4 of Crossing Borders magazine:

I was up very early to get to work on a long, technical and not very interesting publication that I’m editing – specifically to start laying out 125 tables. So… what a relief to receive a message from Pippa and to be reminded that there is something else out there, that one can be a poet and a writer. I couldn’t run around and tell everyone because they were all still sleeping but I attacked those tables with a totally unexpected energy.

I’ve been having Crossing Borders withdrawal symptoms so the exciting news from the magazine team was also a relief from those. Once we had sorted out our e-mail contact, my mentor, John Lindley, and I were very well organised. I submitted my last assignment on 6 January and had a response by the 13th. I enjoyed doing the poetry so much and found the inputs so valuable that I’d love to start Crossing Borders again and do prose as well. 'Fourteen Years' is about my marriage and we just celebrated our fourteenth anniversary, which I guess makes it a very appropriate time to have it published.

The Crossing Borders magazine has been a good channel through which to share the work that other participants are doing so now I feel very honoured to be among them.

Download 'Fourteen Years'