Amatoritsero Ede facts for kids

Amatoritsero Ede is a talented Nigerian-Canadian poet. He is known for his powerful poems and for standing up against unfair treatment. He used to write under the name "Godwin Ede." But he decided to stop using his Christian first name to protest against xenophobia (dislike of people from other countries) and racism (unfair treatment because of someone's race) he saw, especially in Germany. He also wanted to speak out against how Western countries had controlled parts of Africa in the past, which is called colonialism.

Since 2002, Amatoritsero Ede has lived in Canada. He was helped to move there by PEN Canada, an organization that supports writers who need to leave their home countries. Before becoming a well-known poet, he was a Hindu Monk with the Hare Krishna Movement. He also worked as a book editor for a big publisher in Nigeria called Spectrum Books.

His Work and Studies

Amatoritsero Ede is the publisher and managing editor of a literary magazine called Maple Tree Literary Supplement (MTLS). From 2005 to 2007, he also edited an international online poetry journal called Sentinel Poetry Online.

From 2005 to 2006, he was a "Writer-in-Residence" at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. This means he was a special writer who worked and taught there, supported by PEN Canada. He also studied a lot! He was a SSHRC Fellow and earned his PhD in English literature from Carleton University in 2013. A PhD is a very high university degree. His special research was about how African literature fits into the world's main collection of important books. He also has other degrees in literature and German language from the University of Hanover in Germany.

Awards and Recognition

Amatoritsero Ede has won several important awards for his poetry:

• 1993: He won a runner-up prize in the Association of Nigerian Authors' (ANA) Poetry Competition for his early poems called "A Writer's Pains."
• 1998: He won the All-Africa Christopher Okigbo Prize for Literature for his first collection of poems. This prize was created by Wole Soyinka, a famous Nigerian writer who won the Nobel Prize for literature.
• 2004: He won second prize in the first May Ayim Award, which is an international literary prize for Black German writers.
• 2013: His work was longlisted for the Nigeria Prize for Literature, which is one of the biggest literary awards in Nigeria.