Zukiswa Wanner is a South African writer, editor, and publisher born in Zambia, raised in Zimbabwe and currently based in Kenya but who considers the whole African continent her home. Her debut novel, The Madams (2006), was shortlisted for the 2007 K.Sello Duiker Award in 2007. Her third novel Men of the South (2010) was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize Best Book 2011 and the Herman Charles Bosman Award.

In 2014, she was named on the Africa39 list of 39 Sub-Saharan African writers aged under 40 with potential and talent to define trends in African literature.

In 2015, she won the K Sello Duiker Memorial Literary Award for London Cape Town Joburg (2014).

In 2016, she was a Danish International Visiting Artist (DIVA) hosted by World Wide Words.

In 2018, she was a fellow at the University of Johannesburg’s Johannesburg Institute of Advanced Studies (JIAS).

In 2020, she was awarded the Goethe Medal alongside Ian McEwan and Elvira Espejo Ayca, making Wanner the first African woman to win the award.