ABSTRACT
Saga Prize The Saga Prize was set up by Marsha Hunt in 1995 to further black British writing. It ran for four years. Entrants needed a black African ancestor and a birthplace in the U K or the Republic of Ireland when submitting their unpublished first novel. The winner received prize money of £3,000 and a book contract. While being set up, the prize quickly became controversial due to its 'afrocentric' nature and the restrictive definition of blackness. The C o m m i s s i o n for Racial Equality was opposed to the insistence on certain geo-and bio-data bars. The debate over this prize confirms the unsettled nature as to what constitutes black British l i terature. However, the fact that a Folkestone-based travel firm catering for the aged sponsored the prize reveals the wide interest now directed towards black British literature. The four winners of the Prize were (to 1998): Diran Adebayo, Some Kind of Black (1995); Joanna Traynor, Sister Josephine (1996); Judith Bryan Edwards, Bernard and the Cloth Monkey (1997); and Ike Eze-Anyika, Canteen Culture (1998).
