Gabriel Gbadamosi

• Name — Gabriel Gbadamosi • Honorific Suffix — FRSL • Born — 1961 • Birthplace — London, England, UK • Education — Cambridge University • Occupation — Poet, playwright and novelist • Notable Works — Vauxhall (2013) • Awards — Tibor Jones Pageturner Prize • Website — gabrielgbadamosi.com

Gbadamosi was born in London, where he grew up in Vauxhall. He studied English at Cambridge University, earning a BA (Hons) degree. He held an AHRC Creative and Performing Arts Fellowship at Goldsmiths, University of London (2006–2009), based in the Department of Theatre and Performance and researching with the Pinter Centre for Performance and Creative Writing. He has also lectured in dramaturgy at the University of Istanbul, has been Judith E. Wilson Fellow at the Faculty of English of Cambridge University, director of the Society of Authors, and a presenter of BBC Radio 3's arts programme Night Waves.

Gbadamosi's poems have featured in such anthologies as The New Poetry 1968–1988 (1988) and The Heinemann Book of African Poetry in English (1990), and his book collaborations with visual artists include The Second Life of Shells with Mandy Bonnell and Sun-Shine, Moonshine with Conroy Sanderson. His plays include No Blacks, No Irish, Eshu's Faust (Jesus College, Cambridge), Shango (DNA, Amsterdam), Hotel Orpheu (Schaubühne, Berlin), Friday's Daughter (for television), as well as the BBC Radio 3 drama about the Notting Hill Carnival entitled The Long, Hot Summer of '76, which won the first Richard Imison Memorial Award. His 2019 play Stop and Search was staged at the Arcola Theatre, directed by Mehmet Ergen. His most recent play, Abolition, was published in 2023 by flipped eye publishing. Gbadamosi's first published novel, Vauxhall (2013, Telegram Books), described by The Spectators reviewer as "a book of rare poetic insight and humour that absorbs from start to finish", won the Tibor Jones Pageturner Prize and Best International Novel at the Sharjah Book Fair. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2024.