(She/Her)

Olivia Simone (b. 1999) is a writer and artist from East London. Her work has appeared in AZEEMA, Bricks​Magazine, The Wee Sparrow Poetry Press, Hermes Magazine, the Free Black University’s Radical ​Imagination Labs Journal, and Heroica. Olivia is also the founder and editor in chief of Breadfruit - a ​creative writing magazine that showcases the work of women and non-binary people who identify as part ​of the global majority. 

Exploring her interests in existence, the self, and reality, Olivia draws on magical realism to invite readers ​onto a lesser-explored plane of the human experience. At the same time, her work reflects her ​experiences as a Caribbean British queer woman in London. By straddling ideas surrounding identity, ​Blackness, womanhood, and philosophies of existence, nature, and time, she aims to detangle western ​perceptions of reality in order to highlight how reconnecting the self with nature can lead to Liberation. ​

Currently, Olivia is working on her debut novel and completing a funded PhD in Creative Writing at King’s ​College London, where she is exploring precolonial spiritualities in magical realist fiction by African-​Caribbean diaspora women writers.

Instagram: @oliviasimonee_

Website: www.oliviasimone.portfolio