Martin Egblewogbe was born in Ghana in 1975. He has a Ph.D in Physics and works at the University of Ghana, Legon where he is a lecturer in the Department of Physics. He enjoys writing short stories and poetry in his spare time and has contributed to several anthologies.
He also currently hosts the radio show “Writers Project” on CitiFM in Accra, Ghana.
Martin currently lives with his wife and two children in Accra. Martin Egblewogbe’s stories and poetry have appeared in newspapers, anthologies, and several works of his are available online. A number of his stories have won awards and commendations.
Originally self-published as ‘Mr Happy and the Hammer of God’, Martin’s collection of short stories was re-issued by Ayebia Clarke Publishing Ltd. in 2012 as “Mr Happy and the Hammer of God and Other Stories”. In 2010, Martin Egblewogbe and Laban Carrick Hill co-edited the anthology of poetry, “Look Where You Have Gone To Sit” (Woeli, 2010). His second collection of short stories, ‘The Waiting’ was released in 2020.
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Voices that Sing Behind the Veil: Anthology of Short Stories from Africa and the Diaspora (Hardcover)
This 684-page collection is published in collaboration with the Pan African Writers Association which is based in Accra and affiliated to the continental body, the African Union.
The fifty-six stories come from fifteen African countries and elsewhere; Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Burkina Faso and East of the continent, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo in the Great Lakes region, Ethiopia and Tanzania (in setting). They bring in other voices in Zimbabwe, South Africa, Botswana, Malawi, St. Maarten, United States and Britain. The themes are amok and definitely so in a vein of free expression. There are stories of love (of even a man who finds one whilst visiting a dying cancer-patient wife at the hospital in Lagos) or of a husband wrongfully imprisoned in Malawi who upon escape from jail confronts a wife about to wed again, a story very reminiscent of the main character in Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s, Weep Not, Child.
There is hate and there is poverty – one from Kenya which reads like the Zimbabwean novelist, Dambudzo Marechera’s 1978 classic, The House of Hunger. Issues of mental health, corpse donation for scientific research and Coronavirus-19 are addressed alongside Pentecostal redemption, fake prophets and the havoc they exert on societies as do their counterparts in Islam.
Contributing writers include distinguished and award-winning writers, academics and emerging talents such Zaynab Alkali (Nigeria), Ben Okri (UK/Nigeria), Molefi Kete Asante (US), Wesley Macheso (Malawi), Ogochukwu Promise (Nigeria), Grace Maguri (Zimbabwe), Athol Williams (South Africa), Martin Egblewogbe (Ghana), Esther K Mbithi (Kenya), Mary Ashun (Ghana), Wale Okediran (Nigeria) among others.
“These extraordinary stories, mesmerising and beautifully written, are surely connected to a past that remains with us, the experiences of day-to-day living and the limitless imaginings of our futures. The discerning editor combines stories that communicate appreciation with apprehension, presence with essence… a good read.” – Toyin Falola, Historian and the Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair, University of Texas, Austin
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The Waiting
A largely allegorical exploration of the loneliness of an existence based on an alien world-view, Martin Egblewogbe’s The Waiting is a collection rooted in metropolitan Ghana, but its primary territory is the human mind. Juxtaposing his training as a physicist against his curiosity about local myth, he creates a universe that’s both entertaining and erudite. In A Photograph of K & S, Smiling, a completely self-obsessed man, returned home after his father’s death, attempts to explain away his unremarkable life based on one perceived slight from his youth; in The Gonjon Pin (title story for the 2014 Caine Prize anthology) a genius working on a program to predict lottery numbers is stumped by the appearance of an intruder’s disembodied genitals on the wall of his computer engine room; The Making, Rain and Back to the Halls explore futility in different ways, while Atta explores life after death – a theme that reoccurs in a much bleaker guise in The Crwoling Caterpillar. Often Kafkaesque in its isolation of characters and a pervading sense of powerlessness, The Waiting nevertheless maintains a constant hum of humour, nowhere more so than in The Going Down of Pastor Mintumi – in which a pastor who has discovered the pleasures of the flesh late in life overindulges with hilarious consequences. The title story, The Waiting, is judgement day in a twisted mind, filled with the kinds of questions that haunt a life on earth, which, ultimately, is the quest of all art.
₵125.00The Waiting
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Between the Generations: An Anthology for Ama Ata Aidoo at 80
Ama Ata Aidoo, multiple award-winning Ghanaian novelist, poet, playwright and author of the critically acclaimed play, Dilemma of a Ghost, turned 80 in March, 2020. And as part of efforts to celebrate her – the first female African playwright – Between Generations: An Anthology for Ama Ata Aidoo at 80 was released.
Described by Editor Ivor Agyeman-Duah, as ‘international affairs through fiction’, the 230-page collection tackles wealth and inequality, immigration, sisterhood, love lost and regained and other contemporary issues in Africa and the world.
Opening with Aleppo by Ama Ata Aidoo, the anthology includes stories by eleven other contemporary African writers: Nigerian novelists, Sefi Atta, Ogochukwu Promise; South African novelist, Njabulo S. Ndebele; Senegalese novelist Boubacar Boris Diop, Ghanaian novelists, Ayesha Haruna Attah, Bisi Adjapon, writers Martin Egblewogbe, and Gheysika Adombire Agambila; Rwandan writer, Louise Umutoni and Cameroonian writer Ray Ndebi.₵115.00 -
The Gonjon Pin and Other Stories: The Caine Prize for African Writing 2014
The Caine Prize for African Writing 2014 brings together the five shortlisted authors’ stories along with 12 other stories from the best new writers. Insightful, arresting and entertaining – this collection reflects the richness and range of current African writing.Caine Prize 2014 Shortlisted Stories:
Phosphorescence Diane Awerbuck (South Africa)
Chicken Efemia Chela (Ghana/Zambia)
The Intervention Tendai Huchu (Zimbabwe)
The Gorilla’s Apprentice Billy Kahora (Kenya)
My Father’s Head Okwiri Oduor (Nigeria)The Caine Prize African Writers’ Workshop Stories 2014:
The Lifebloom Gift Abdul Adan (Somalia/Kenya)
The Gonjon Pin Martin Egblewogbe (Ghana)
As A Wolf Sweating Your Mother’s Body Clifton Gachagua (Kenya)
Pam Pam Lawrence Hoba (Zimbabwe)
Lily in the Moonlight Abubakar Adam Ibrahim (Nigeria)
Running Elnathan John (Nigeria)
The Murder of Ernestine Masilo Violet Masilo (Zimbabwe)
All the Parts of Mi Isabella Matambanadzo (Zimbabwe)
Blood Work Barbara Mhangami-Ruwende (Zimbabwe)
The Sonneteer Philani A Nyoni (Zimbabwe)
Eko Hotel Chinelo Okparanta (Nigeria)
Music from a Farther Room Bryony Rheam (Zimbabwe)₵40.00₵45.00