New Writing

Two UEA alumni have been included on the longlist for the 2022 Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses. Mona Arshi is nominated for her debut novel Somebody Loves You, published by And Other Stories last year. Melanie Mauthner is nominated for her translation of Our Lady of the Nile, the first novel by Rwandan author Scholastique Mukasonga, published last year by Daunt Books. Mona (pictured) graduated from the UEA MA in Creative Writing (Poetry) in 2012. Her debut collection Small Hands won the Forward Prize for best first collection in 2015. Dear Big Gods was published in 2019 by Liverpool University Press, and last year she created Shifting Lines, a multimedia poetry installation, in collaboration with the cross-artform organisation Mutiny as part of UEA’s Future & Form project. Melanie graduated from the MA in Creative Writing (Prose Fiction) in 2007. Our Lady of the Nile was originally published by Gallimard in France in 2012, and Melanie’s translation was first published by Archipelago Books of New York in 2016, going on to be shortlisted for that year’s International Dublin Literary Award.  The shortlist for the Republic of Consciousness Prize will be announced in March.