Surveying the
Shortlists
FROM PUBLISHING TRENDS (OCTOBER 2001)
Black-tie
shebangs are thick on the calendar this time of year,
with publishers scurrying from one award ceremony to
the next, buoyed along by the hope of slapping those
“Winner!” stickers on their authors’ books — or at least
hoping to have a good meal and a quick exit from the
fęte du jour.
September
brought The Lannan Literary Award, with prize
money of $600,000, including a $200,000 Lifetime Achievement
award to Robert Creeley. October heats up with
the Frankfurt eBook Award, the first award designed
to recognize achievements in the (slowly) emerging ebook
industry. For those in the neighborhood, the winners
of five awards will be announced on October 10 at the
Frankfurt Opera House, with the Author’s Grand Prizes
of $50,000 going to the best fiction and nonfiction
ebooks. A children’s award will be presented in Bologna
in April. See www.iebaf.org
for details.
Then there’s
the Booker, bestowed upon fiction writers from
the UK and its empire, and the less-known Neustadt
International Prize for Literature. The Booker prize
money is a solid $30,000, plus the enticing chance to
actually sell books on the strength of winning it. It
is administered by the Book Trust, and is, of course,
famous for its petulant jurists, and the professional
betting that accompanies the release of its long- and
shortlist (no longlist favorites actually made it to
the shortlist this year, which includes The Dark
Room by Rachel Seiffert and Ali Smith’s
Hotel World). See www.bookerprize.co.uk.
The Neustadt
may lack the Booker’s buzz, but it carries a more than
modest $50,000 in prize money (plus a replica of an
eagle feather cast in silver, sure to excite every writer’s
quill fetish). This is a biennial award (David Malouf
won last year) sponsored by the University of Oklahoma
and World Literature Today, the international
literary quarterly founded in 1927 at OU. The award
was created in 1969 as the “Books Abroad International
Prize for Literature,” and has existed since under a
variety of names. The 2002 winner will be announced
at the Neustadt prize jury banquet this October 19 (click
here).
And coming at the end of the month is The Whiting
Writers’ Award, given for fiction, nonfiction, poetry,
and playwright. In 2000 (for the 16th year in a row)
ten new writers found themselves $35,000 richer for
showing “talent and promise.” The winners are announced
October 26; call 212 336-2138 for details.
Then there
are the Nobel Prizes, celebrating their hundredth
anniversary this year. The prize — for achievements
in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, and peace
— consists of a medal, a personal diploma, and a prize
of 10,000,000 kroner (around $1 million). Winners are
announced in October and the awards ceremony is on December
10 in Stockholm. See www.nobel.se.
November
brings (counting all the previous iterations) the 52nd
annual National Book Awards, presented at a lavish
dinner on November 14. The awards recognize achievement
in four areas: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and young
people’s literature. The winners are selected by a five-member,
independent judging panel for each genre, and receive
a $10,000 cash award and a crystal sculpture. The final
shortlist (five finalists for each genre) is announced
on October 11, and each shortlist winner receives a
$1,000 prize. Call 212 685-0261 or go to www.nationalbook.org.
Last, least
(monetarily), but newest, is the Mercantile Library’s
Fadiman Award, named in honor of Clifton Fadiman,
and presented to a living author of fiction whose book
the jury feels is worthy of rediscovery. The $5,000
prize and medal is sponsored by Bookspan (Fadiman
was a longtime judge of Book-of-the-Month). The
jury is made up of committee members of the board, and
they accept suggestions from the literary community
at large. The award presentation is set to take place
at the library’s annual benefit on November 13. Call
212 755-6710 for details.
©2001 Publishing Trends
