Montreal resident picks up Man Asian prize

The winner of the second annual Man Asian Literary Prize has a Canadian connection – the 31-year-old Filipino author lives in Montreal, where he works as a copy-editor at The Gazette.

Miguel Syjuco, who received an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University, picked up the $10,000 (U.S.) prize yesterday in Hong Kong for his debut novel Ilustrado, which tells the story of fictional man-of-letters Crispin Salvador. The novel was written in English but has yet to find a North American publisher. (The Man Asian is awarded to books that are unpublished in English.)

The judges’ panel was presided over by the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, who praised the book for its stylistically daring premise:

Ilustrado seems to us to possess formal ambition, linguistic inventiveness and sociopolitical insight in the most satisfying measure. Brilliantly conceived, and stylishly executed, it covers a large and tumultuous historical period with seemingly effortless skill. It is also ceaselessly entertaining, frequently raunchy, and effervescent with humour.

Man Booker also-ran Sebastian Barry “entitled to be disappointed” … says Booker juror

Horse-trading, you say? Compromise? The acceptable third choice? This would appear to be what adjudicating a major literary prize comes down to. Little more than a month after the Guardian published its exposé covering 40 years of Booker deliberations, Michael Portillo, the chair of this year’s five-member jury, explains on the Man Booker website that the eventual winner, Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger, was not a unanimous choice to take the prize.

Two other books appeared closer to certain jurors’ hearts, according to Portillo. Steve Toltz’s comic novel A Fraction of the Whole apparently split the jury along gender lines, with the men being moved to tears by one passage that was read aloud to them, while the women remained stoic. Portillo himself calls Sebastian Barry’s novel The Secret Scripture “the most beautiful book” on the list, and calls it “a glorious piece of writing with not a word misplaced.” Why, then, did Barry not win? Portillo claims that there were concerns about the book’s plot.

The final decision saw the jury presenting a united front, but Portillo still seems to feel that Barry got the shaft:

The judges made it through without “blood on the floor” (to the media’s disappointment) but we were not unanimous, except in the sense that everyone accepted the choice once made. I am entirely happy with our decision, but Barry is entitled to be disappointed.

In the end, Portillo says that “Adiga won out too because his angle seemed so fresh.” Not everyone agrees with this assessment, however. Writing in the Telegraph, Sameer Rahim says the book “reads like the first draft of a Bollywood screenplay (no romance or songs sadly),” and blogger Nilanjana Roy takes issue with the freshness of Adiga’s novel, saying that “as anyone in India who reads widely enough knows, he’s not ‘the first to go where no other Indian author has gone before’ as reviews in the west have proclaimed.”

Canadian kids’ authors on long longlist for rich Swedish prize

Two Canadian storytellers and one Nova Scotia literacy group are in the running for the world’s richest children’s literary prize. Ottawa kids’ novelist Brian Doyle, Quebec author and illustrator Marie-Louise Gay, and Read to Me!, a family literacy program, have all been nominated for the 2009 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, worth about $800,000 (or 5-million Swedish crowns).

It’s still too early for the Canadian candidates to get their hopes up, however, as there are 150 other nominees on the list. The winner, whose work “upholds the highest artistic quality and evokes the deeply humanistic spirit that Astrid Lindgren treasured,” will be announced in March, with an awards gala in May. Past winners include Philip Pullman, Maurice Sendak, and Sonya Hartnett.

The international prize was founded in 2002 after the death of Lindgren, creator of Pippi Longstocking.

Rawi Hage wins IMPAC

Montreal author Rawi Hage’s De Niro’s Game has won one of the world’s richest literary prizes. The debut novel, published here by House of Anansi Press, was announced today as the winner of this year’s IMPAC Dublin International Literary Award, worth €100,000 (roughly $160,000 Canadian). Hage is only the second Canadian to win in the 13-year history of the prize – Alistair MacLeod won in 2001 for No Great Mischief – and his book is the first debut novel (CORRECTION: debut book) to win.

The win comes at a good time for Hage, with his second novel, Cockroach, poised for release in just a couple of months and an appearance at the BookExpo Canada trade show set for Sunday. (See Q&Q‘s cover profile of the author, from the brand-new July/August 2008 issue, here.) Anansi is also releasing a new edition of De Niro’s Game with a new cover, an IMPAC emblem, and a lower price of $14.95 (down from $18.95.)

The IMPAC selection process begins with nominations from public libraries around the world. De Niro’s Game emerged from a longlist of 137 titles and a shortlist of eight. The jury was made up of international authors: Spain’s José Luis de Juan, Britain’s Patricia Duncker, Ireland’s Eibhlín Evans, Nigeria’s Helon Habila, and Pakistan’s Aamer Hussein. The jury citation said of the novel, “Its originality, its power, its lyricism, as well as its humane appeal all mark De Niro’s Game as the work of a major literary talent and make Rawi Hage a truly deserving winner.”

Laying out the welcome mat for author Stephen Harper

In an article posted on workopolis.com, author Susan Swan welcomes Stephen Harper to the world of publishing by offering him a few tips for his upcoming book on the history of hockey.

Swan uses Harper’s “day job” as prime minister to segue into criticisms of the government’s slashing of funding for cultural programs abroad and comments about the difficulties and limitations of obtaining grants and literary prizes.

You mentioned that the research for your book has slowed down since you became our 22nd prime minister. Naturally, I wasn’t surprised, and I thought of suggesting that you try for Ontario’s $1,500 emerging writers’ grant and hire your own researcher. Like all emerging writers in Ontario, you are entitled to apply, although this modest start-up will barely cover a researcher’s fee for any more than a month. Nor will it help much to offset some of your moving costs, Mr. Prime Minister, if, God forbid, you lose your day job in another election.

…

Alas, the funding that once helped Canadian writers reach their world audiences has vanished. Thanks to you slashing $11.8-million from our cultural programs abroad, 30 years of support has gone overnight. Alas again, our cultural diplomats who were once employed to promote our culture abroad now have no way to publicize anything, let alone our writing. And knowing the stock you place in short-term results, these hard-working folks may soon be out of a job altogether.

As covered in Q&Q Omni today, The Writer’s Union of Canada, of which Swan is vice-chair, held a demonstration on Parliament Hill yesterday to draw attention to the financial and cultural contributions the arts make to Canada.

Black bile? Yes, indeed.

In an essay originally published in his magazine Front & Centre and republished on The Danforth Review, Ottawa writer and Black Bile Press editor Matthew Firth calls for the end of literary prizes and contests of all stripes, citing the usual missing-the-forest-for-the-trees argument. But why include it in In Other Media? First, it’s important to be reminded of the view that politics, money, overabundance, and the literary scene’s incestuousness call the relevance of prizes into question. Second, Firth makes all kinds of colourful statements, comparing literary awards to the prizes given for the sporting endeavours of six-year-olds, calling the big prizes “particularly sickening,” and deeming the whole system “a perpetual circle of self-congratulation more closely resembling a circle jerk than anything else.”

Related links:
Click here for the full essay on The Danforth Review