Ethiopian-American poet Mahtem Shiferraw has been selected as the winner of the 2015 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets. The award is presented by the African Poetry Book Fund and Prairie Schooner, the literary magazine published by the University of Nebraska Press and the creative writing program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
As a result of the prize, Shiferraw will have her poetry collection Fuchsia published by the University of Nebraska Press and Amalion Press in Senegal in the spring of 2016.
Shiferraw received a bachelor’s degree from Loyola Marymount University in California and holds a master of fine arts degree in creative writing from the Vermont College of Fine Arts.
