Dubravka Ugresic nominated for Man Booker International Prize

E.J. Van Lanen — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 17:30:50 +0000

Our own has made the “Judges’ List of Contenders” for the ! In case you were curious:

The Man Booker International Prize…highlights one writer’s continued creativity, development and overall contribution to fiction on the world stage.

This will be the third time they’ve given the prize—Chinua Achebe won in 2007 and Ismail Kadaré in 2005. They give the winner £60,000 and also, if necessary, they give a translation prize of £15,000—I presume to translate the books that haven’t yet been translated, since the prize is for English writing or “work [that] is generally available in translation in the English language”. Here’s the entire Judges’ list:

Peter Carey (Australia)
Evan S. Connell (USA)
Mahasweta Devi (India)
E.L. Doctorow (USA)
James Kelman (UK)
Mario Vargas Llosa (Peru)
Arnošt Lustig (Czechoslovakia)
Alice Munro (Canada)
V.S. Naipaul (Trinidad/India)
Joyce Carol Oates (USA)
Antonio Tabucchi (Italy)
Ngugi Wa Thiong’O (Kenya)
Dubravka Ugresic (Croatia)
Ludmila Ulitskaya (Russia)

They’ll be announcing the winner sometime in May.

It’s some awfully stiff competition, but we think Dubravka can pull it off. Plus, she’s due to win one of .

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o

E.J. Van Lanen — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 14:54:26 +0000

The Elegant Variation is a copy of Wizard of the Crow by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, the exiled Kenyan author who now teaches at UC-Irvine.

Here’s an with Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o—talking about Wizard of the Crown—on the Leonard Lopate show.

ngugi wa thiong’o – Three Percent

Dubravka Ugresic nominated for Man Booker International Prize

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o