Elma Shaw
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Elma Shaw | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Citizenship | Liberia |
| Education | American University |
| Occupations |
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| Writing career | |
| Notable work | Redemption Road (2008) |
Elma Shaw is a Liberian author and publisher. Her novel Redemption Road: The Quest for Peace and Justice in Liberia (2008) is set in Monrovia during the presidency of Charles Taylor, in the aftermath of the First Liberian Civil War. Its protagonist counsels survivors of the war while coming to terms with her own experiences of it.[1] Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, then president of Liberia, wrote the foreword.[2]
Shaw established the publishing house Cotton Tree Press in 2008 and self-published Redemption Road as its first title.[3][4][5] The press has since issued fiction, nonfiction, children's books and an anthology edited by Shaw.[6][7] A 25-minute documentary, The Road to Redemption (2008), took the novel as its starting point.[8] The West African Examinations Council's harmonized list of Literature-in-English texts for the 2026–2030 West African Senior School Certificate Examination names Redemption Road as one of two African prose texts.[9][10]
Early life and education
[edit]Shaw has said that she spent her early childhood in Liberia, where she attended the Hilton Van Ee School, until her family moved to England when she was five.[3] The family returned in time for the 1979 rice riots and the 1980 coup d'état.[3] She finished ninth grade at J. J. Roberts, then attended Cushing Academy, a boarding school in Massachusetts, and American University in Washington, D.C. She also completed two study-abroad programs in France.[3]
Her bachelor's degree was in communication media, with an emphasis on broadcast journalism. Her master's degree was in film and video, with an emphasis on screenwriting.[11][12][3]
After university she returned to live in Liberia during Taylor's presidency. By her account she was still there for Sirleaf's election in 2005 and for the creation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia.[3]
Career
[edit]Writing and journalism
[edit]Shaw has written for Liberia Travel & Life Magazine, Pambazuka News and UNMIL Focus.[6] She has described most of her writing as creative nonfiction, with poems and stories when they suit the subject, and has said that her work tends to follow themes of social justice, women's empowerment and personal or spiritual development.[3]
Cotton Tree Press
[edit]Cotton Tree Press was established in January 2008 to publish literary and nonfiction works by Liberian and other African writers.[4] Shaw has said that she founded it that year and that Redemption Road was its first book.[3] The press later published Birds Are Singing, which Shaw describes as the last novel of Wilton G. S. Sankawulo, and Konkai: Living Between Two Worlds, a memoir by Mardia Stone.[3][7]
Shaw also edited Monrovia Rain and Other Stories Lost and Found, an anthology of short stories. Its contributors include Vamba Sherif, Augustus Y. Voahn, Gii-Hne Russell and M. Woryonwon Roberts.[6][7]
In 2020 the press added two imprints. Legacy publishes memoirs and nonfiction by African entrepreneurs and community leaders; its first title, issued in April, was Finding Purpose in Challenging Times by Patrick Karangwa, who runs a nongovernmental organisation serving refugees in Rwanda. Leroi Books publishes children's titles and began with Rainy Season Rhymes, poems by James V. Dwalu illustrated by Regis F. Muhirwa.[6][7]
The African Books Collective, a non-profit distribution outlet for African publishers, lists Cotton Tree Press among its participating publishers.[4] Shaw has said that she has always worked remotely, from wherever she lives, and that the press's staff do the same.[6]
Big Belly Business
[edit]Shaw was lead writer of Big Belly Business, a guide to pregnancy for Liberian women published by The What to Expect Foundation.[6][3] A report published on allAfrica in August 2016 described the guide as the first pregnancy guide written in simple Liberian English and said it was being distributed to 50,000 pregnant women. According to the same report, the program was led by the Open Society Initiative for West Africa and run by 13 partner organisations, began in June 2012, and had brought together pregnant women, men and elders at more than 100 weekly Big Belly Clubs.[13]
Appearances and teaching
[edit]The Center for Global Development in Washington, D.C. scheduled a discussion with Shaw about Redemption Road for 26 August 2008, as part of its Global Development Matters meetup series.[2]
In April 2020 Shaw was one of the writers featured in the second season of Afrolit Sans Frontières, an online festival of African writers organised by Zukiswa Wanner after the COVID-19 lockdowns began. She read from the novel in a livestream on Instagram from Kigali on 21 April 2020, hosted by Remy Ngamije.[14][6]
Later that year she taught an online creative writing workshop for middle- and high-school students. Nineteen enrolled, in two sections that met weekly on Zoom for eight weeks, and the students came from Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and Côte d'Ivoire.[6]
Redemption Road
[edit]Background and publication
[edit]Redemption Road is Shaw's first novel.[12] It was self-published: Cotton Tree Press, the company Shaw founded that year, issued it in 2008 in Monrovia and Washington, D.C.[1][3][5] Editions have appeared in hardcover and paperback.[15] Sirleaf wrote the foreword.[2][5]
On 28 October 2008, according to a Government of Liberia statement, Sirleaf met Shaw, described there as U.S.-based, at her office in the Foreign Ministry in Monrovia. The statement called the novel self-published and said that Shaw thanked Sirleaf for writing the foreword.[5]
Shaw has said that the novel grew out of real stories of the war. She spoke with both former fighters and survivors while researching it, and she wanted to record those experiences and to help survivors with healing. When she began writing, she has said, people responsible for killings were living openly in post-war Liberia, few programs existed for survivors, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had not yet been established.[3] According to Shaw, the title comes from the name of a road where government officials were executed on 22 April 1980, shortly after the coup.[3][14]
Synopsis
[edit]The novel follows Bendu Lewis, a young woman in Monrovia who counsels survivors of the civil war while struggling with memories of her own wartime experiences. When a commander known as Cobra, who once held her captive, reappears in the city, she resolves to bring him to justice. The decision also forces her to confront her own past.[1] Stefanie Sevcik of Georgia College & State University describes Bendu as both a victim and a perpetrator of wartime crimes, and notes that she founds a nongovernmental organisation and tries to reclaim her lost daughter.[16]
Reception and analysis
[edit]The Analyst, a Monrovia newspaper, published a review of the novel in October 2008. The review described it as a depiction of the horrors and burdens of the conflict and said that Shaw chose a fictional form to give Liberians direction in deciding between peace and justice.[11]
Sevcik's article in the Journal of the African Literature Association (volume 15, issue 2) treats the novel as a model for thinking about individual and collective justice in Liberia after the civil wars of 1989–2003. It draws on African women thinkers including Lauretta Ngcobo and Desiree Lewis to extend Judith Butler's work on precarity and Jacques Derrida's model of inheritance. Sevcik argues that the protagonist's efforts, which include founding an organisation and seeking her daughter, ground a form of "bodily redemption". In that reading the novel turns away from reliance on systemic justice and toward the female body as a site of pain, agency and healing.[16]
Adaptation and curriculum
[edit]The Road to Redemption is a 25-minute documentary directed by Jonathan Stack. It had its international premiere at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam in 2008. The festival's catalogue says the film takes Shaw's novel as its point of departure. Shaw does not appear on screen but reads passages from the book, and the film includes Liberian women who the catalogue says inspired the story.[8] The film's listing on Culture Unplugged names three of them: Jackie Redd, Mickey Kesseley and Florence Ballah.[17]
The West African Examinations Council's harmonized list of Literature-in-English texts for the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for 2026–2030 names two African prose texts: So the Path Does Not Die by Pede Hollist and Redemption Road.[9] In December 2025 Brittle Paper reported that students in Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and the Gambia would study the novel for the WASSCE and equivalent O-level examinations.[10]
Awards and recognition
[edit]Recognition for Redemption Road includes:
| Year | Organisation | Category | Work | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Liberian Entertainment Awards | Best Author | Redemption Road | Won | [18] |
| 2010 | Writer's Digest International Self-Published Book Awards (17th annual) | Mainstream fiction | Redemption Road | Honorable mention | [19] |
Bibliography
[edit]- Shaw, Elma (2008). Redemption Road: The Quest for Peace and Justice in Liberia. Foreword by Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Monrovia and Washington, D.C.: Cotton Tree Press. ISBN 978-0-9800774-0-7. (hardcover; paperback ISBN 978-0-9800774-1-4)
- Shaw, Elma (ed.). Monrovia Rain and Other Stories Lost and Found. Cotton Tree Press. ISBN 978-0-9800774-9-0.
- Lead writer, Big Belly Business (pregnancy guide for Liberian women). The What to Expect Foundation.
Personal life
[edit]Shaw is married and has two children.[20] She lives in Rwanda. By April 2020 she had been based in Kigali for about seven years.[14][6]
References
[edit]- 1 2 3 "Redemption Road: the quest for peace and justice in Liberia / Elma Shaw". Research Catalog. New York Public Library. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 3 "Upcoming CGD Event—Novelist Elma Shaw Discusses 'Redemption Road'". Center for Global Development. 19 August 2008. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Forte, D. Othniel. "Elma Shaw: Author/Journalist". Liberian Literature Review (Interview). Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 3 "Cotton Tree Press, Liberia". African Books Collective. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 "Liberia: President Johnson Sirleaf Commends Liberian Writer for Self-Publishing" (Press release). Monrovia: Government of Liberia. 28 October 2008. Retrieved 5 October 2026 – via allAfrica.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Q&A: ABC-Words on the Times – Elma Shaw of Cotton Tree Press". Africa in Words. 29 January 2021. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 "The Road to Redemption". International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 "Harmonized List of Literature-in-English Texts for the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) 2026–2030" (PDF). West African Examinations Council. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 Uwisike, Blessing (23 December 2025). "Elma Shaw's 'Redemption Road' Makes History on WASSCE Literature Curriculum". Brittle Paper. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 "Liberia: Elma Shaw Depicts Country's Horrific Past". The Analyst (Book review). Monrovia. 29 October 2008. Retrieved 5 October 2026 – via allAfrica.
- 1 2 "Elma Shaw". African Books Collective. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- ↑ "Liberia: New Liberian Book and Program Delivers Education to Pregnant Women". allAfrica. 5 August 2016. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 3 "Elma Shaw at Afrolit Sans Frontières Virtual Literary Festival Season 2". James Murua's Literary Blog. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- ↑ "Redemption Road: the quest for peace and justice in Liberia". Lynnfield Public Library. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- 1 2 Sevcik, Stefanie (2021). "'Peace in the Home is Peace in the Nation': Redemption after the Liberian Civil Wars". Journal of the African Literature Association. 15 (2). doi:10.1080/21674736.2020.1839305.
- ↑ "The Road to Redemption". Culture Unplugged. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- ↑ "2nd Annual Liberian Entertainment Awards". Lady Brille Magazine. 27 January 2010. Archived from the original on 3 March 2014. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- ↑ "17th Annual Self-Published Book Awards Winners – Mainstream Fiction". Writer's Digest. 22 March 2010. Retrieved 5 October 2026.
- ↑ "Elma Shaw". AbeBooks. Retrieved 5 October 2026.