About the invited guest of this month’s YELF Literary Evening. November Edition
Su’ur Su’eddie Vershima Agema is a husband, father, editor, publisher, cultural enthusiast and development worker. He was listed on Nigerian Writers Award’s 100 Most Influential Nigerian Writers under 40 (2017 and 2018) and EGC’s Top 50 Contemporary Poets Who Rocked Nigeria (2012-17). He was also recently Curator, Black History Month/Project and founding President, African Writers (Society) at the University of Sussex in England, United Kingdom where he earned a second master’s degree in International Education and Development under the esteemed Chevening scholarship scheme. He is a past chairman of the Association of Nigerian Authors (Benue State Chapter) and a former coordinator of the National Teen Authorship Scheme covering six states in Nigeria. He is currently an Associate at the School of Education and Social Work, University of Sussex. and also the convener of the Benue Book and Arts Festival.
Su’eddie is the author of Home Equals Holes: Tale of an Exile (Winner, Association of Nigerian Authors’ Prize for Poetry, 2014); The Bottom of another Tale (Shortlist, Abubakar Gimba Prize for Short Stories, 2015 & Shortlist, Association of Nigerian Authors Prize for Prose 2014); Once Upon a Village Tale(Shortlist, Association of Nigerian Authors’ Children’s Literature Prize); and Bring our casket home: Tales one shouldn’t tell (Nominee, Association of Nigerian Authors’ Prize for Poetry 2013).
Among other awards, he also won the Mandela Day Short Story Prize (2016) and was shortlisted for the Saraba/PEN Nigeria Poetry Prize 2013, Association of Nigerian Authors Prize for Prose Fiction (2014) and the Soyinka Prize for African Literature (2018).
He is the Chief Executive/Lead Editor at SEVHAGE Publishers, and Team Leader/Lead Researcher at SEVHAGE Literary and Development Initiative. Su’eddie blogs at http://sueddie.wordpress.com and is @sueddieagema on Twitter/Instagram/Facebook.