Tag: literary awards

2014 Miguel de Cervantes Prize

April 23, 2014

Elena PoniatowskaAuthor Elena Poniatowska has won this year’s Cervantes Prize. The 82-year old reporter and activist has written more than three dozen books, including novels, essays, children’s books and nonfiction.  “The daughter of French-Polish immigrants to Mexico, Poniatowska began her career writing for the newspaper Excelsior. In an interview with the Madrid newspaper El Pais, she recounted how the painter Diego Rivera called her the little Polish girl who asks too many questions.” You can read the entire article here – and check the EPL catalog for her works in both Spanish and English.

Laura

2014 Pulitzer Prize Winners

April 16, 2014

pulitzerThis year’s Pulitzer Prize Winners were announced Monday at New York’s Columbia University. The prizes honoring excellence in journalism and the arts have been awarded since 1917. This year’s recipients include The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt in the Fiction category; The Flick by Annie Baker for Drama; The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832 by Alan Taylor for History; Margaret Fuller: A New American Life by Megan Marshall for Biography; Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation by Dan Fagin for General Nonfiction; 3 Sections by Vijay Sesadri for Poetry. For a list of all the winners and finalists see this NYT article.

Laura

PEN/Faulkner Fiction Prize

April 4, 2014

fowlerThe 2014 PEN/Faulkner prize for Fiction was awarded to NYKaren Joy Fowler for her novel We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. The $15,000 prize will be presented at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington on May 10. A panel of three judges, including Madison Smartt Bell, Manuel Munoz, and Achy Obejas, chose the work from more than 430 novels and short story collections. According to a statement by Mr. Munoz: “Fowler captures an altogether new dimension of the meaning – and heartbreak – of family dynamics.” You can read more in this short NYT article.

Laura

PEN/Hemingway Award Winner

March 19, 2014

penhemNoViolet Bulawayo is the 2014 winner of the Hemingway Foundation’s PEN Award for her novel We Need New Names. The prize honoring best debut fiction was established in 1976 by Mary Hemingway in memory of her husband Ernest Hemingway. Along with the $10,000 award, the prize includes a one-week residence at the University of Idaho, and a fellowship at the Ucross Foundation in Wyoming. Born in Zimbabwe in 1981, Ms. Bulawayo is currently a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. Read the NYT article here.

Laura

Another Week, Another Honor For George Saunders

March 10, 2014

George SaundersThe first winner of the Folio prize, created in response to “shortcomings of the Man Booker prize”, was awarded today to the short story collection Tenth of December by George Saunders. Judges, including Lavinia Greenlaw, Michael Chabon, Sarah Hall, Nam Le and Pankaj Mishra, praised the stories as “darkly playful” saying: ” they take us to the edge of some of the most difficult questions of our time and force us to consider what lies behind and beyond them.” The other candidates on the shortlist were Red Doc by Anne Carson; Schroder by Amity Gaige; Benediction by Kent Haruf; The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner; A Girl is a Half-formed thing by Eimear McBride; and A Naked Singularity by Sergio de la Pava. Mr. Saunders recently won the Story Prize, yet another major literary award for this author. Read the entire article here.

Laura

George Saunders Story Prize Winner

March 6, 2014

tenth of decGeorge Saunders won $20,000 for his collection of stories Tenth of December. According to the judges of the Story Prize: “George Saunders offers a vision and version of our world that takes into account the serious menace all around us without denying the absurd pleasures that punctuate life.” Runners-up Andrea Barrett for Archangel and Rebecca Lee for Bobcat each won $5,000. You can read the title story from Tenth of December in this NPR post. And check the EPL catalog for other works by this author.

Laura

2013 Dylan Thomas Prize

November 8, 2013

clairevaye29-year-old Claire Vaye Watkins has won this year’s Dylan Thomas Prize for her debut story collection Battleborn. “Aimed at encouraging raw creative talent worldwide” the prize is restricted to writers under 30 and is worth 30,000 pounds (about $48,000).” Ms. Watkins also won two other major prizes on the same day: the $10,000 Rosenthal Family Foundation award and the $20,000 Story Prize. Her stories are set in the American West and were inspired by her childhood in Nevada. She told Fresh Air: “I always say I exist in a constant state of homesickness, and that’s really the context in which I wrote this book, too.” Read more about this prize-winning author’s very interesting background here.

Laura

Neustadt International Prize for Literature

November 5, 2013

MiaCouto-620x415The 2014 Neustadt International Prize for Literature has been awarded to Mozambican author Antonio Emilio Leite Couto (Mia Couto). The first Mozambican author to be nominated for and to win this prize, Couto noted: “It is a sad moment for Mozambique because we are starting a war that we thought would never come back again. So to receive this good news is something like a compensation for me.” Born in 1955, his first novel Sleepwalking Land was published in 1992. Gabriella Ghermandi, who nominated him for the prize, said: “He is an author who addresses not just his country but the entire world, all human beings.” The $50,000 biennial prize is sponsored by the University of Oklahoma, the Neustadt family, and the university’s magazine World Literature Today. Often called the “American Nobel, it is the only international literary award for which poets, novelists and playwrights are equally eligible. Read more in today’s NPR article.

Laura

Man Booker Prize Shortlist Announced

September 10, 2013

novioletFinalists for the 2013 Man Booker Prize, Britain’s most prestigious literary award were announced this morning.  Open to writers from Britain, Ireland or one of the Commonwealth nations, the prize has been criticized in the past  as “either too popular or not readable enough.” This year’s shortlist includes the following six finalists:

We need New Names, by NoViolet Bulawayo
The Luminaries, by Eleanor Catton
Harvest, by Jim Crace
The Lowland, by Jhumpa Lahiri
A Tale for the Time Being, by Ruth Ozeki
The Testament of Mary, by Colm Tóibín

The winner, to be named on October 15 in London, will receive a cash prize of 50,000 pounds (or approximately $78,000). Read the full article here.

Laura

2013 Booker Prize Nominees

July 24, 2013

Colm Tóibín has been listed for the Man Booker prize for the third time, with The Testament of MaryThirteen diverse novels have been nominated for this year’s Man Booker prize, Britain’s most prestigious literary award. Robert MacFarlane, the chairman of judges, said the books “range from the traditional to the experimental, from the first century A.D. to the present day, from 100 pages to 1,000 and from Shanghai to Hendon.” The winner will be announced October 15. You can read more here. The nominated books are listed below:

Laura

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