Just in today: the longlist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, world's richest book award, featuring 162 titles from five continents, including books by two Nobel laureates, five past IMPAC winners, thirty-five debut novels, a record-breaking forty-two novels in translation, and (only!) four Irish writers. All nominees come from an international panel of libraries--a fact that has always endeared me to this particular literary award.
High-profile nominees include books by Colm Tóibín, Colum McCann, William Trevor, JM Coetzee, Yiyun Li, Orhan Pamuk, Amos Oz, David Malouf, Hilary Mantel, Anita Brookner, Margaret Atwood, Jayne Anne Phillips, Barbara Kingsolver, Paul Auster, A.S. Byatt, Dan Chaon, Hélène Cixous, E.L. Doctorow, Dave Eggers, Nick Hornby, John Irving, Lorrie Moore, Joyce Carol Oates, Kim Stanley Robinson (whose famous Mars trilogy I have been absorbed in lately), Dubravka Ugresic, Jean-Philippe Toussaint, and Colson Whitehead.
You can see a nice profile on the longlisters over at The Irish Times, where writer Eileen Battersby says that a glance at the nominees indicates "that quality fiction is alive and well, as is the pleasure of reading..."
The IMPAC award is a project of Dublin City Council and is administer by Dublin City Public Libraries. It is open to books written in any language. Judges for the 2011 award include Irish author John Boyne, German poet and translator Michael Hofmann, and Welsh author Tessa Hadley. The shortlist will be announced on the April 12, 2011 and the winner on June 15, 2011.
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