TJ (Tarfa) BENSON (fiction writer, non-fiction writer, editor, visual artist; Nigeria) has had writing appear in Transition Magazine, Saraba, Jalada Africa, Catapult, Bakwa Magazine and elsewhere. His story collection We Won’t Fade into Darkness (2018) was shortlisted for the Saraba Manuscript Prize; his first novel, The Madhouse, appeared in 2021. A grant from the U.S. Embassy in Abuja made possible his participation.
2022 Spring Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer, poet
Tariro NDORO (poet, fiction, nonfiction; Zimbabwe) is the author of the poetry collection Agringada: Like a Gringa, Like a Foreigner (2019), which won the inaugural NAMA Award for Outstanding Poetry Book from Zimbabwe's National Arts Council. A finalist in several other poetry competitions, she has had her work anthologized and translated. Ndoro, who has a BSc in Microbiology and an M.A. in Creative Writing, lives in Harare. Her participation in the 2022 Spring Residency is made possible by the U.S. State Department.
2022 Spring Resident
critic, fiction writer, non-fiction writer, scholar
Silvia HOSSEINI (non-fiction; Finland) is a Tampere-based teacher, literary critic, and media commentator, and the author of essay collections Pölyn ylistys [In Praise of Dust] (2018) and Tie, totuus ja kuolema [The Way, The Truth, and Death] (2021). Hosseini was awarded the Kalevi Jäntti Prize and has been nominated for both the Helsingin Sanomat Literature Prize and the Toisinkoinen Literature Prize. She participates courtesy of an anonymous donor.
2022 Spring Visitor
editor, fiction writer, non-fiction writer, publisher, scholar
IWP alum Billy Karanja KAHORA is the author of the non-fiction novella The True Story Of David Munyakei (2010) and the story collection The Cape Cod Bicycle War (2019). His stories have been shortlisted for the Caine Prize for Africa Writing; among his award-winning screenplays are those for Soul Boy and Nairobi Half Life. His work has appeared in Chimurenga, McSweeney’s, Granta Online, Internazionale, Vanity Fair, Kwani? , and elsewhere. Among his numerous organizational appointments, he has been the managing editor of Kwani Trust, a Nairobi-based literary network, and the curator of its festival. A founding partner of Saseni!, a creative writing teaching platform, he currently teaches Creative Writing at the University of Bristol (UK).
2023 Resident
editor, fiction writer, journalist, non-fiction writer
Marina PORCELLI (fiction writer, essayist; Argentina) is the author of the novella Cuaderno de invierno [ A Winter Notebook] (2021), a collection of essays on gender Nausica. Viaje al otro lado de la otredad [Nausicaa. Journey to the Other Side of Otherness] (2021), the story collections La cacería [The Hunt] (2016) and De la noche rota [Of the Broken Night] (2009/2021), and others. Her work has garnered her the 2014 Edmundo Valadés Ibero-American Award and the 2021 Eduardo Mallea National Essay Award; she has attended residences in Mexico, Canada, and China. A frequent contributor to Latin American newspapers, she writes the column “Nocaut Lírico” [The Lyrical Knockout] about gender and boxing for Playboy Mexico. Her participation was made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.
2023 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer, playwright, screenwriter
Raoul DE JONG (novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist; the Netherlands) has published five collections of travel stories and four non-fiction novels. Among the latter, Jaguarman (2020) was shortlisted for the European Union Prize for Literature and nominated for several Dutch and Belgian literary prizes; the 2023 long-form essay Boto Banja [The Boat Dance] won de Toneelschrijfprijs for best theater writing, and in 2022 the city of Rotterdam awarded De Jong’s overall work the de Anna Blaman Prize. He is completing his first screenplay and participates in the residency thanks to a grant from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.
2023 Resident
activist, fiction writer, journalist, non-fiction writer
Martha Cecilia RUIZ (nonfiction; fiction; editor; arts promotor; Nicaragua) has for the past three decades worked as a reporter, scriptwriter, and a host of radio and tv programs. The organization she founded, “Proyecto365MCR,” promotes Nicaraguan women’s creative writing. The author of Familia de cuchillos [Family of knives] (2016), she has also contributed fiction and non-fiction to a dozen national and regional anthologies. Her participation was made possible by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.
2023 Resident
journalist, non-fiction writer
Artur DOMOSŁAWSKI (non-fiction, journalist; Poland) has among his titles Gorączka latynoamerykańska [Latin American Fever], Śmierć w Amazonii [Death in the Amazonas], the essay collection Wykluczeni [The Outcasts] and two biographies: Ryszard Kapuściński: A Life, for which he was voted “Journalist of the Year” for 2010, and Wygnaniec. 21 scen z życia Zygmunta Baumana [The Exile. 21 Scenes from the Life of Zygmunt Bauman], the winner of the 2022 “Juliusz” prize for best biography. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, El País, Letras Libres, Etiqueta Negra, Words Without Borders, The Baffler, and elsewhere; his work has been frequently awarded, and widely translated. His participation is courtesy of the Paul Engle Fund.
2023 Resident
editor, fiction writer, journalist, non-fiction writer
Mansoura EZ-ELDIN منصورة عز الدين (fiction; nonfiction, editor; Egypt), nominated by Beirut39 among the 39 Best Arab-language Writers Under 40, is an award-winning and widely translated author of 10 books. -خطوات في شنغهاي [Walks in Shanghai: on the Meaning of Distance Between Egypt and China] won the 2021 Ibn Battuta Prize for travel literature; in 2014, the Sharjah International Book Fair nominated her جبل الزمرد [Emerald Mountain] as Best Arabic Novel. Her writing has appeared, among other places, in The New York Times, A Public Space, Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Granta. She is the managing editor of the cultural weekly Akhbar Al-Adab and, since 2003, its book review editor. A grant from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State funds her participation.
2023 Resident
fiction writer, non-fiction writer, poet, visual artist
Yashika GRAHAM (poetry, fiction, nonfiction, visual artist; Jamaica), the winner of the 2019 Mervyn Morris Prize for Poetry, has also received a Centrum Writer’s Residency and read at literary festivals including Dodge Poetry (USA), Bristol (UK), the World Festival of Poetry (Venezuela) and Port Townsend (USA). Her poetry, prose, and literary criticism have been published internationally; her debut collection Some of Us Can Go Back Home is forthcoming from Blouse & Skirt Books. She participates courtesy a grant from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.
2023 Resident
editor, fiction writer, non-fiction writer, playwright, poet, translator
Tzveta SOFRONIEVA Цвета Софрониева (poet, fiction writer, playwright, essayist; Germany/Bulgaria), a physicist and historian of science by training, is the author of over 20 books, including Multiverse (2020), a collection of new and selected poems written originally in German, Bulgarian and English and A Hand Full of Water (2012), translated from the German, the recipient of a 2009 PEN/Heim Translation Fund grant and the 2012 Cliff Becker Book Prize in Translation. Her poetry has been translated into 19 languages; her theater work has been supported by Bulgaria’s National Cultural Fund. She participates courtesy of the Max Kade Foundation.
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