Advertise With Us
About Us
Listen
Watch

Login

/

Subscribe

Home

News

Carnival

Business

Sports

E-Paper

Features

Opinion

Traffic Cameras

Life

Classifieds

Death Notices

Community

Real Estate

About Us

Contact Us

Home
News
Carnival
Sports
E-paper
Business
Classifieds
Other
Death Notices
Traffic Cameras
Covid-19
Features
Opinion
Games
Subscriptions
Real Estate

T&T writer gets prestigious award

by

#meta[ag-author]
20200919093853
20200920
Brenda Mohammed

Brenda Mohammed

RYAN BA­CHOO

ryan.ba­choo@cnc3.co.tt

In the midst of the gloom of the pan­dem­ic, one T&T writer has found rea­son to cel­e­brate. Bren­da Mo­hammed re­ceived the Prashamshith Pathr (Cer­tifi­cate of Ap­pre­ci­a­tion) from one of the world’s most ac­tive writ­ers’ fo­rum, Mo­ti­va­tion­al Strips, and the In­di­an gov­ern­ment’s most re­spect­ed lit­er­ary in­sti­tu­tion, Gu­jarat Sahitya Acad­e­my. It was award­ed to 350 promi­nent writ­ers from 80 coun­tries as In­dia marked its 74th In­de­pen­dence Day on Au­gust 15.

It’s a phe­nom­e­nal achieve­ment for a woman who was bat­tling ovar­i­an can­cer 15 years ago. Forced to seek med­ical help abroad, Mo­hammed trav­elled to the Uni­ver­si­ty of Mi­a­mi Sylvester Can­cer Cen­tre for surgery and chemother­a­py. Not on­ly did she ful­ly re­cov­er and was able to re­turn to her job at Re­pub­lic Bank but that jour­ney shaped every­thing she did af­ter that.

As a can­cer sur­vivor, many who were ail­ing sought her ad­vice en­cour­ag­ing her 2013 book I Am Can­cer Free. It be­came very pop­u­lar among those fight­ing the dis­ease.

“That gave me the en­cour­age­ment to write more books,” Mo­hammed said.

That’s ex­act­ly what she did. To date, she has writ­ten 27 mul­ti-genre nov­els climb­ing the lad­der at var­i­ous promi­nent writ­ers groups around the globe.

A year af­ter join­ing the Lit­er­ary Fo­rum, Mo­ti­va­tion­al Strips, the world’s most ac­tive writ­ers’ fo­rum with writ­ers from 163 coun­tries and month­ly vis­i­tors cross­ing 7.3 mil­lion, she was ap­point­ed Re­gion­al Di­rec­tor of Op­er­a­tions. In Oc­to­ber 2018, she was ap­point­ed an Hon­orary Mem­ber of the World High­er Lit­er­ary Aca­d­e­m­ic Coun­cil of World Na­tions Writ­ers’ Union.

Her Prashamshith Pathr award made head­lines in sev­er­al news­pa­pers around the world.

“I was de­light­ful­ly sur­prised when I saw my name on the list of awardees. This is not just a pre­mi­um award for me, but more than that, I val­ue it as the suc­cess of Trinidad and To­ba­go writ­ers,” she said.

Founder of Mo­ti­va­tion­al Strips, Shi­ju Pal­lit­hazheth said it was “a hap­py mo­ment to see Trinidad and To­ba­go shin­ing in the world lit­er­ary map and Bren­da Mo­hammed crowned as its lit­er­ary gem.”

While it maybe the high­light of her writ­ing ca­reer, it cer­tain­ly isn’t her first award. In Jan­u­ary, the Vista­bel­la res­i­dent was in­duct­ed in­to The In­die Au­thors Hall of Fame in the Unit­ed States —an es­tab­lish­ment for self-pub­lished au­thors who have achieved fame. In De­cem­ber 2018, she was award­ed the World Lau­re­ate in Lit­er­a­ture by World Na­tions Writ­ers’ Union. On Au­gust 31, 2019, Mo­hammed was ho­n­oured by the Sey­chelles Gov­ern­ment Ac­cred­it­ed Lit­er­ary So­ci­ety [ LLSF] for her con­tri­bu­tion to world po­et­ry, cre­ativ­i­ty, and writ­ing ex­per­tise.

Her gen­res in­clude mem­oirs, sci­ence fic­tion, ro­mance, self-help, mys­tery, chil­dren’s books, and po­et­ry. In fact, her self-help book, How to Write for Suc­cess, be­came an im­por­tant guide for new and as­pir­ing au­thors. It re­ceived a five-star re­view and a five-star seal from Read­ers Fa­vorite one month af­ter pub­li­ca­tion. It al­so won the gold award in the cat­e­go­ry non-fic­tion in Con­nec­tions EMagazine Read­ers’ Choice awards 2019 and a sil­ver medal for sec­ond place in all gen­res.

It would seem that Mo­hammed doesn’t need any fur­ther in­spi­ra­tion with so many awards and ac­co­lades be­stowed on her but she says: “This award has giv­en me en­cour­age­ment to do more work in the field of lit­er­a­ture that will ben­e­fit the world at large.”

Now, as great T&T writ­ers such as VS Naipaul, CLR James and Earl Lovelace have done in the past, she wants to cre­ate lit­er­a­ture as a form of tourism for this coun­try.

“Al­though this is a lit­er­a­ture award, I see this as a way of boost­ing tourism in Trinidad and To­ba­go. Mo­ti­va­tion­al Strips is the world’s most ac­tive writ­ers’ fo­rum and has writ­ers from 163 coun­tries with month­ly vis­i­tors cross­ing 7.3 mil­lion. All eyes are now fo­cused on Trinidad and To­ba­go and when­ev­er the pan­dem­ic ends, I hope we will see a flux of vis­i­tors to this coun­try.”

Though the Prashamshith Pathr award is her crown­ing achieve­ment thus far, it is by no means the fi­nal chap­ter in Bren­da Mo­hammed’s sto­ry.


Click HERE to Login

Want FREE access to all our content? Sign up HERE!

Tagged in:

Responses

Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored

Trending

Acting CoP suspends officer in traffic warden viral video
Nine Vindra Naipaul-Coolman murder accused to receive $20M from State
Cop captured in social media row with Traffic Warden suspended
Harewood-Christopher in pole position for CoP job
State must pay $20m for failed Naipaul-Coolman case
President sends Erla Christopher's name to Parliament for CoP nominee debate
Highest-ranking name for new Police Commissioner delivered to President
Griffith silent on Kamla’s call for unity: PDP, Duke, some ex-UNC MPs not interested
Piarco records the lowest temperature in January in 10 years
US resident held with ammo in Piarco airport
Today's
Guardian
View
Subscribe

Publications

Hungry Ghosts

Hungry Ghosts

Hungry Ghosts

Hungry Ghosts

Pain, power and poison...a review of Hungry Ghosts by Kevin Jared Hosein

20230126132207
2022 TS Eliot Prize winner Anthony Joseph as he reads from his winning collection of poems Sonnets for Albert at the award ceremony in London on January 16.

2022 TS Eliot Prize winner Anthony Joseph as he reads from his winning collection of poems Sonnets for Albert at the award ceremony in London on January 16.

Adrian Pope

2022 TS Eliot Prize winner Anthony Joseph as he reads from his winning collection of poems Sonnets for Albert at the award ceremony in London on January 16.

2022 TS Eliot Prize winner Anthony Joseph as he reads from his winning collection of poems Sonnets for Albert at the award ceremony in London on January 16.

Adrian Pope

2022 TS Eliot poetry prize winner memorialises 'charismatic' father

20230126141654

Numbness in your feet?

20230123072450

Your walking gear matters!

20230116101944
Created by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

News

Business

Sports

Life

Opinion

Tobago Today

Classifieds

Death Notices

Subscriptions

Real Estate

Categories

News
Business
Sports
Features
Opinion
Traffic Cameras
Death Notices

INFORMATION

About Us
Contact Us
Advertise With Us
Privacy Policy
Subscriptions
Terms of Services

Digital Media

The Big Board Company.
Real Estate
Classifieds

TELEVISION

CNC3 Television

RADIO

951 Remix
Sangeet 106.1 FM
Sky 99.5FM
Slam 100.5 FM
Vibe CT 105 FM
Mix 90.1 FM (Guyana)
Freedom 106.5 FM

About Us

Guardian Media is the premier provider of multimedia solutions and authoritative insight on news, politics, business, finance, sports, and current affairs. Our brand portfolio includes CNC3, Guardian, TBC Radio Network and The Big Board Company.

Contact us

Send us an e-mail here or call us at +1-(868)-225-4465

Follow us