Otosirieze, a writer, culture journalist, curator, and media consultant, is the founder and editor of
Open Country Mag. For the magazine, he has written longform features and Profiles of
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie,
Rita Dominic, and
Cardinal Arinze; curates
The Next Generation, a series of special issues highlighting rising literary voices; co-conceptualized Nigeria’s first formal bestseller list, with bookstore Rovingheights; and runs a Curatorial Fellowship, funded by Africa No Filter, mentoring creatives in art, fashion, music, and media.
He was editor of
Folio Nigeria, then CNN’s exclusive media affiliate in Africa, before its relaunch on
Open Country Mag, and was briefly Business/Creative Head of its planned portfolio company Folio Digital Media. There, he wrote over a hundred pieces on the Nigerian culture scene, covering innovation in over 20 fields, including film, art, music, tech, sports, cuisine, fashion, journalism, sculpture, beauty, health, and activism.
He was chair of The Gerald Kraak Prize, a South African initiative for storytelling about gender, sexuality, and social justice, and edited its fourth anthology
The Beautyful Ones Have Just Been Born. He was a judge for The Morland Scholarship, a British grant for African writers. He has led or joined editorial teams at a host of platforms and projects in African literature, including at 14, the pioneering LGBTQ collective.
His fiction has appeared in
The Threepenny Review and
Transition. He has given guest lectures at Dartmouth College and at Grinnell College. He has an MA in African Studies and a BA in English/History from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and an MFA in Fiction from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, where he was Adjunct Assistant Professor of Creative Writing. He taught English at Godfrey Okoye University, Enugu.
In 2019, he received the inaugural The Future Awards Africa Prize for Literature. In 2020, he was named among “The 100 Most Influential Young Nigerians” by Avance Media. He has appeared on
With Chude's list of "The 150 Most Interesting Nigerians in Culture." Twitter & Instagram: @otosirieze. Website:
otosirieze.com.
5 Responses
When is the deadline for the submission of entries please?
I have a book yet to be published.The title is Destigmatized,its theme is on culture and traditions and the girl child as well as it’s possibility of spreading the HIV virus through female circumcisition. I t can be recommended for use in schools and colleges or universities as a literature text.
I hope to get a response from you soon.thank you.
I have just concluded works on a play,The Kingmakers. I want to know if you accept dramatic works that try to interprete the Africa socio political concerns .
When is the deadline? Can l still submit my manuscript?
The Kingmakers,is the title of my recent manuscript. It is a play,
a literary appraisal of a society that is committed to history rather than the future,a society in the hand of carnivores and a frustrated saviour entangled by a perennial social debacle .
I want to know if you accept dramatic works. When is the deadline for submission? If you find my story interesting and publishable , l want to be excused from financial commitments. Let us agree on a term and get my royalty paid.