On a grand Thursday evening, July 11, the Royal Society of Literature announced the appointment of 42 new Fellows and Honorary Fellows elected in 2024. The new fellows signed their names in the RSL roll book using a pen from the charity’s permanent collection.
Among the 42 new fellows announced are:
- Gabriel Gbadamosi (Irish-Nigerian)
- Okechukwu Nzelu (Nigerian)
- Nii Ayikwei Parkes (Ghanaian)
Gabriel Gbadamosi (born 1961) is a poet, playwright, and novelist of Irish-Nigerian descent. He is the founding editor of the online literary platform WritersMosaic, an initiative of The Royal Literary Fund. He held an AHRC Creative and Performing Arts Fellowship at Goldsmiths, University of London 2006–2009, based in the Department of Theatre and Performance and researching with the Pinter Centre for Performance and Creative Writing. Gbadamosi’s poems have featured in such anthologies as The New Poetry 1968–1988 (1988) and The Heinemann Book of African Poetry in English (1990), and his plays include No Blacks, No Irish, Eshu’s Faust (Jesus College, Cambridge), Shango (DNA, Amsterdam) and other notable works.
Okechukwu Nzelu is a Manchester-based writer. In 2015 he was the recipient of a Northern Writers’ Award from New Writing North. His debut novel, The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney (Dialogue Books), won a Betty Trask Award; it was also shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Polari First Book Prize, and longlisted for the Portico Prize. In 2021, it was selected for the Kingston University Big Read. He is a regular contributor to Kinfolk Magazine, and a lecturer in Creative Writing at Lancaster University.
Nii Ayikwei Parkes born in the United Kingdom to parents from Ghana, where he was raised, is a performance poet, writer, publisher and sociocultural commentator. He is one of 39 writers aged under 40 from sub-Saharan Africa who in April 2014 were named as part of the Hay Festival’s prestigious Africa39 Project. He writes for children under the name K.P. Kojo.
The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) celebrates and supports writing of all kinds. They are a charity for writers and readers throughout their literary lives and are led by writers and believe that all literature matters. The RSL’s Honorary Fellows are individuals who have made a significant contribution to the advancement of literature in the UK, or who have rendered special service to the Society.
For more information on the full list of the new 42 appointed fellows of The Royal Society of Literature, kindly click here.
Congratulations Gbadamosi, Gabriel and Parkes on this awesome feat!
Bakare Oluwatobiloba
I write to educate, motivate and define history with literature. Just being me!
