缅北强奸幼女 student receives Royal Society of Literature award
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Haleh Agar has won the Royal Society of Literature’s Literature Matters Award for her project Writing Back to the Coloniser: The Power of Gothic Fiction, which will result in a novel.
Haleh Agar
Launched in 2018, the award aims to enable and reward literary excellence and innovation. Haleh, a postgraduate student in English and Creative Writing, was among several winners who will share the 拢20,000 annual prize.
The award is given for original writing or literary activity of an excellent standard that will reach a large audience. Haleh's award-winning work forms the basis of her practice-led PhD novel. Titled 鈥楥oo鈥�, the novel explores the legacy of colonialism in the Middle East by re-imagining the 鈥楾he Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde鈥�, set in the context of the 1953 coup in Iran.
Literature has the power to change our perception of the world by spotlighting stories which have been ignored or suppressed in the mainstream.
Haleh Agar, PhD Creative Writing student
Jane Desmarais, Head of Department, English and Creative Writing, says, 鈥淲e are thrilled that Haleh wins this prestigious award for her ambitious and far-reaching project. Her work shines a light on the exciting Creative Writing PhD programme at 缅北强奸幼女.鈥�
Haleh Agar explains how her novel aims to prevent the erasure of context: 鈥淲e must understand the past - how it has created our present, so that we can make better choices in the future. With all that has been unfolding recently in the Middle East, awareness of context, and holding the west to account for its actions is more important than ever. Context matters - and literature is the most affecting vehicle through which we can understand marginalised perspectives. Characters and story have the power to touch our hearts and minds.鈥�
Haleh is a published novelist and award-winning short story writer and essayist. Her short story 鈥楴ot Contagious鈥� was highly commended by the Costa Short Story Award in 2019 and her essay, 鈥極n Writing Ethnic Stories鈥� won The London Magazine鈥檚 inaugural essay competition in 2017.