Five exceptional stories shortlisted for Florence Staniforth Student Fiction Prize

The College has a strong tradition of supporting and celebrating creative writers with the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize being testament to this. It is now celebrating its 10th successful year and released its longlist of authors for the 2020 prize on 11th May. It has been the catalyst for numerous bestselling debuts and emerging literary talent.

The College has also run a student prize for the last 10 years - last year being relaunched as the Florence Staniforth Student Fiction Prize.
Funded by the Florence Staniforth Award for Excellence in Creative Writing, the prize is for students from any discipline studying at Lucy Cavendish College. Students are invited to submit a short story to a panel of judges led by College Lecturer and Director of Studies in English Dr Isobel Maddison. Also on the panel are published authors and creative writing teachers, Jo Browning Wroe and Miranda Doyle. The winner of the Student Prize will be awarded £100 and will be announced on the same evening as the main Fiction Prize award ceremony, later this year.

Dr Isobel Maddison says:

"This student prize for a short story brings the college Fiction Prize, and our commitment to fostering creative writing, into closer alignment. This year the judges were thrilled by the standard of the stories and we’re delighted the prize has unearthed such fresh and distinctive voices."

Jo Browning Wroe comments:
“'The entries this year were a very rich assortment of original and engaging stories. It was a pleasure to read them and a challenge to shortlist only five. Congratulations to the shortlisted authors and indeed to all the entrants, who made it a competition of genuine quality, of which Lucy Cavendish can be proud.”

Miranda Doyle adds: 

“It was indeed very difficult to shortlist this year. The stories described many memorable characters and distinctive settings – expertly crafted voices telling each unique story.”

The five shortlisted students are:

Yoojung Chun

Yoojung Chun is an MPhil student reading Medieval and Renaissance Literature at Lucy Cavendish College. Yoojung enjoys writing poetry and prose, both in her native Korean and in English. Her interests include religion, food,  intercultural experiences and human relationship with the idea of perfection. 

Charlotte Hofton (since this article she has been announced as the Student Fiction prize winner with 'Journeys')

Charlotte Hofton came to Lucy Cavendish in 2019 to study English as an undergraduate after a career mainly in feature journalism. She has worked on the Sunday Telegraph and on the Sunday Express, and after leaving London was a columnist on her local paper. A number of other jobs have come her way, including working as an au pair on the tiny Channnel Island of Sark, a spell as a highly unqualified gardener in a London park, and as a bookseller in Hatchards, Piccadilly. She much enjoyed Lucy Cavendish’s creative-writing workshop course and tries to keep up with her own writing among all those academic essays.

Tina Jenkins

Tina Jenkins began her career as a cub reporter on local newspapers in West London. She has written a column for the London Evening Standard then went into broadcasting, working in newsrooms for the BBC, ITV and ITN. After that, she went on to produce and direct many documentaries for the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and US networks. By doing the Masters in Crime and Thriller Writing, she is hoping to find a voice and a place among British crime writers. 

Hanine Kadi

Hanine has been studying literature for a little more than five years now. She studied French & English literature as an undergrad and is now completing an MA in Comparative Literature. Books have always been an essential component of her life. She is always on the hunt for a gripping narrative, one that will fascinate her, confuse her, make her uncomfortable. She is of the opinion that words, when structured into well-arranged sentences, can be extremely powerful. For as long as Hanine can remember, she has always loved writing and making up stories. She remembers coming up with outlandish characters and taking them on adventures to entertain her younger siblings. Now she is trying her hand at poetry and at fiction, writing the stories she would want to read.

Maxine Sibihwana 

Maxine Sibihwana is a Ugandan poet and writer based in London. She seeks to connect her historical heritage with her contemporary self by responding to African proverbs with a focus on relationships, the home, religious rituals, love, as well as exploring queerness. She recently started a Masters in creative writing at Cambridge University and has read her work at festivals such as Last Word at the Roundhouse, Erase Erase Erupt, Hay Festival, Brainchild, Latitude Festival and The London Literary Festival.

About the judges

Dr Isobel Maddison - College Lecturer and Director of Studies in English
Isobel is a Fellow of Lucy Cavendish College, where she is the College Lecturer and Director of Studies in English, having also been Vice President from 2013-2019. She has published widely on writers including Katherine Mansfield, Elizabeth von Arnim, Dorothy Richardson, George Bernard Shaw, Max Beerbohm, Eric Ambler and Agatha Christie. She was President of the International Elizabeth von Arnim Society from 2015-2019 and remains a member of the society’s steering group. 

Jo Browning Wroe - Creative Writing Supervisor
Jo is Creative Writing Supervisor at Lucy Cavendish. Her debut novel, A Terrible Kindness, will be Faber’s superlead title in spring 2022.  She worked in publishing for over ten years before studying for an MA in Creative Writing at UEA. She has written for educational publishers in the UK and the US, The New Statesman and the Church Times.

Miranda Doyle, Writer and Teacher
Miranda's A Book of Untruths is published by Faber & Faber. Teaching at the University of Cambridge's Institute of Continuing Education, the Faber Academy, Spread the Word, and on The Lucy Cavendish Creative Writing Course, she loves the work of supporting other writers.