PAMUK LONGLISTED FOR ASIA’S PRESTIGIOUS LITERARY PRIZE
December 5, 2012 – 14:39 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net – Three debut novelists and a Nobel laureate were
among the 15 writers longlisted for Asia’s most prestigious literary
prize, with entries spread across the region from Turkey to Japan,
AFP reported.
The longlist for the $30,000 Man Asian Literary Prize was drawn from
108 published works from nine different Asian countries, submitted
to a panel of judges led by literary critic and journalist Maya Jaggi.
“The far-ranging stories on our longlist draw the reader into some
beautiful and some gruelling landscapes,” said Jaggi in a statement.
“From the glaciers of northern Pakistan to the unforgiving Saudi
desert; from an affluent Istanbul seaside resort to a Bombay opium
den — and further afield to Montreal and Mexico.”
“Silent House,” an early work from Turkish writer and 2006 Nobel Prize
in Literature winner Orhan Pamuk, made the list after appearing in
English for the first time.
Turkey and Iran are among the 35 countries eligible for the prize,
which is looking for a new sponsor with London-based Man Group ending
its funding for the Asian prize after the 2012 event.
A total of seven books appear in translation, including “Northern
Girls” by Chinese author Sheng Keyi, about a sixteen-year-old who
abandons her Hunan village and heads for the bright lights of Shenzhen.
Other works include two books that were shortlisted for the 2012 Man
Booker Prize for Fiction, which was won by record-breaking British
author Hilary Mantel for “Bring up the Bodies” in October.
“The Garden of Evening Mists” by Malaysia’s Tan Twan Eng follows a
young law graduate who discovers the only Japanese garden in Malaya
and its secretive owner and creator.
Jeet Thayil’s “Narcopolis”, a three-decade exploration of opium
addiction, was also shortlisted for the 2012 Man Booker Prize for
Fiction and he is one of three Indian authors on the Asian Prize
longlist.
“Goat Days” by Benyamin follows the fate of an expat worker in the
Gulf who is propelled into a slave-like existence as a goat herder
in the middle of the brutal Saudi desert.
Anjali Joseph’s “Another Country”, follows a twenty-something woman
through Paris, London and Bombay at the dawn of the Millennium.
“This list testifies to the strength and variety of new writing coming
out of a culturally emergent Asia,” said Professor David Parker,
Executive Director of the Asian Literary Prize. “It is full of stories
the world hasn’t heard before and which the world needs to hear.”
A shortlist of up to six titles will be unveiled in early January
before a winner is announced in March.
The Man Asian Literary Prize began in 2007 and is given to the best
novel by an Asian writer, either written in English or translated
into English.
The 2011 Man Asian Literary Prize was awarded to South Korean author
Kyung-sook Shin for her novel “Please Look After Mom”, a story about
a family’s guilty soul-searching after the disappearance of their
elderly mother that has gone on to sell more than two million copies.