Frances Ogamba, JAY Lit Prize for Fiction judge and Nigerian short-story writer, has been named one of ten finalists for the 2026 Chautauqua Janus Prize and has won the 2025 Gulliver Travel Grant from the Speculative Literature Foundation.
Chautauqua Janus Prize Finalist
Ogamba is among the ten finalists selected for the 2026 Chautauqua Janus Prize for her short story “The Making”. The story ties together a woman’s struggle with infertility and the living, active role of spiritual traditions and ancestors in our lives.
This year marked a record-breaking ninth edition of the prize, which was established in 2018 to celebrate emerging writers whose work demonstrates daring formal and aesthetic innovations that challenge and reshape readers’ imaginations. The 2026 Chautauqua Janus Prize received 281 submissions. The prize is judged by author Deborah Miranda, an award-winning writer, scholar, and enrolled member of the Ohlone-Costanoan Esselen Nation in California, and author of Bad Indians: A Tribal Memoir and four poetry collections. Miranda will announce the winner in May, and the award ceremony is scheduled for August 12, 2026, during the Chautauqua Institution’s summer session.
The Chautauqua Janus Prize carries a $5,000 award and travel stipend, with the winner delivering a lecture during the Institution’s summer season.
2025 Gulliver Travel Grant Winner
Ogamba has also been awarded the 2025 Gulliver Travel Grant by the Speculative Literature Foundation for her piece, The Further.
Since its establishment in 2004, the Gulliver Travel Grant has supported writers of speculative literature in their research endeavors, awarding $1,000 annually to cover airfare, lodging, and other travel expenses. The grant recognizes exceptional work in speculative fiction, poetry, drama, and creative nonfiction.
About Frances Ogamba
Ogamba is a 2025 Mercatus Center Don Lavoie Fellow at George Mason University and a 2025 Tin House Scholar. In 2024, she received the Jacobson Scholar award at the Hawkinson Foundation for Peace and Justice and was selected as a Miles Morland Writing Scholar. She is also a 2025 recipient of the Diversity Grant from the Horror Writers Association.
Her previous honors include the 2024 Walter H. Judd Travel fellowship, the 2024 COGS Research grant, the AKO Caine Prize editorial fellowship, and the 2022 College of Liberal Arts fellowship from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Her awards also include the 2022 Diana Woods Award in Creative Nonfiction, the 2020 Kalahari Short Story Competition, and the 2019 Koffi Addo Prize for Creative Nonfiction. Most recently, she was a runner-up for the 2024 Minnesota BIPOC Emerging Writer Award and a finalist for the 2023 Locus Awards, 2019 Writivism Short Story Prize, and 2019 Brittle Paper Awards for short fiction.
Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Hopkins Review, Ambit, Ninth Letter, Channel, Chestnut Review, CRAFT, New Orleans Review, Lunch Ticket, Vestal Review, The Dark Magazine, Horror Library, Uncharted, Jalada Africa, and The Best of World SF.
About the Prize
The Chautauqua Janus Prize, awarded annually since 2018, celebrates emerging writers whose single work of short fiction or nonfiction demonstrates daring formal and aesthetic innovations that challenge literary conventions and reshape readers’ imaginations. Named for Janus, the Roman god who looks to both the past and future, the prize honors writing that combines a command of craft with the ability to renovate our understanding of both tradition and innovation. The prize is funded by a generous donation from Barbara, Hilary, and Twig Branch.
Congratulations, Frances Ogamba!
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