South African Literary Awards winners announced—Mongane Wally Serote is South Africa’s new Poet Laureate
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Header image taken by Victor Dlamini

Mongane Wally Serote has been announced as South Africa’s new Poet Laureate at the 2018 South African Literary Awards ceremony.

Serote becomes South Africa’s third poet laureate, after Mazisi Kunene and Keorapetse Kgositsile, who died in January.

Now in their thirteenth year, the SALAs are awarded annually by the wRite Associates and the Department of Arts and Culture to celebrate literary excellence in all the languages of South Africa.

Hermann Giliomee and Ronnie Kasrils were honoured with Lifetime Achievement Literary Awards, while photographer Peter Magubane received the Chairperson’s Award. Leon Rousseau and SM Mofokeng were honoured with Posthumous Literary Awards.

Dan Sleigh won the inaugural Novel Award for his book 1795, while Malebo Sephodi took home the First-time Published Author Award for her memoir Miss Behave.

The Poetry Award went to Kelwyn Sole for his collection Walking, Falling.

The Nadine Gordimer Short Story Award was jointly awarded to Nick Mulgrew, for The First Law of Sadness, and Nicole Jaekel Strauss fpr As in die mond.

There were no nominations this year for the K Sello Duiker Memorial Literary Award, for novels written by authors under forty.