Binyavanga Wainaina
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Binyavanga Wainaina (born 1971) is a Kenyan author, playwright, journalist and winner of the Caine Prize.
Wainaina was born in Nakuru in Rift Valley province. He attended Moi Primary School in Nakuru, Mangu High School in Thika, and Lenana School in Nairobi. He later studied commerce at the University of Transkei in South Africa, after which he worked in Cape Town for some years as a freelance food and travel writer.
In July 2002 he won the Caine Prize for African Writing for his short story "Discovering Home". He is the founding editor of Kwani?, the first literary magazine in East Africa since Transition Magazine. Since its founding, Kwani? has since become an important source of new writing from Africa; with several writers having been nominated for, and having won, the Caine Prize subsequently.
In 2003, he was given an award by the Kenya Publisher's Association, in recognition of his services to Kenyan Literature. He has written for The EastAfrican, National Geographic, The Sunday Times (South Africa), and The Guardian (UK).
He is presently a Writer-in-Residence at Union College in Schenectady, NY (USA), where he is teaching, lecturing and working on a novel.
[edit] Publications
- Discovering Home (Short Story, G21Net, 2001)
- An Affair to Dismember (Short Story)
- Beyond the River Yei: Life in the Land Where Sleeping is a Disease (Photographic Essay, Kwani Trust) With Sven Torfinn
- How To Write About Africa (Article, satire, Granta 92 2005)
