The Strand
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00pfhrp/The_Strand_15_03_2012/
]]>Monday 14th May 2012
HONG KONG – A leading international literary critic, along with two Asian born prize winning novelists are set to judge the 2012 Man Asian Literary Prize, as submissions open for the most prestigious literary prize in Asia.
Chairing this year’s judges will be award winning cultural journalist and literary critic, Maya Jaggi. She has reported on arts and culture from five continents, and is an influential voice on world literature having interviewed 12 Nobel prizewinners in literature, as well as figures from Eric Hobsbawm and Noam Chomsky to Salman Rushdie and Tom Stoppard. The late cultural critic Edward Said described her interview with him as in a class of its own.
Jaggi has been a judge of literary awards including the Orange, Commonwealth Writers, David Cohen, Warwick and Guardian fiction prizes, as well as the Caine prize for African writing, the Banipal prize for Arabic literary translation, and the Harvill Secker/Foyles Young Translators’ prize. Educated at Oxford University and the London School of Economics, she was awarded an honorary doctorate by Britain’s Open University in 2012 for her outstanding contribution to education and culture, especially in “extending the map of international writing.”
Joining Jaggi on the panel will be award winning Vietnamese-American novelist Monique Truong and Vikram Chandra, most notably winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize.
Truong is a writer based in Brooklyn, New York. Her first novel, The Book of Salt (2003), was a national bestseller, a New York Times Notable Fiction Book, and the recipient of many awards including the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award. Her second novel, Bitter in the Mouth (2010) also received critical acclaim. Born in Saigon, South Vietnam, in 1968, Truong and her family came to the United States as refugees in 1975. A graduate of Yale and Columbia Universities, Truong is currently a 2012 Visiting Writer at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies.
Vikram Chandra’s latest novel, Sacred Games, was the recipient of the Hutch Crossword Prize for English Fiction (India), a Salon.com Book Award for Fiction (USA), and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award (USA). He is also the author of Love and Longing in Bombay and Red Earth and Pouring Rain. His previous honours include the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book (Eurasia region) and the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best First Book, the David Higham Prize, and the Paris Review Discovery prize. He currently divides his time between Bombay and Berkeley, California, where he teaches creative writing at the University of California.
Chair of Judges of the 2012 Man Asian Literary Prize, Maya Jaggi said, “I am excited to be chairing the jury for Asia’s premier literary award. As a prize that is pan-Asian and multilingual in scope, it recognises the importance of translation in bringing the continent’s literature to readers across Asia, as well as to the world.”
Chair Director of the Man Asian Literary Prize, Professor David Parker said, “As the Prize opens for submissions in its sixth year we are very excited to discover what new writing and new talent Asia will surprise us with in 2012.”
The winner of the 2011 Man Asian Literary Prize, Please Look After Mom by Kyung-sook Shin has gone on to sell over 2 million copies worldwide. The South Korean writer became the first female and South Korean writer to win the Man Asian Literary Prize in its five year history, and was awarded the USD $30,000 prize money in March 2012.
Submissions for the 2012 Man Asian Literary Prize are now open until 31st August, 2012. Submissions are called from publishers, based in any country, of novels written by Asian authors.
The longlist will be announced on 4th December 2012, the shortlist on 9th January 2013 and the winner announced at a black tie Prize Dinner on 14th March 2013 in Hong Kong, the home of the Prize.
For full entry rules and further information please visit this webpage.
The Prize can be followed on Twitter @MALPrize and on facebook.com/MALPrize
For press enquiries please contact Mr. Harrison Kelly: media@manasianliteraryprize.org +(852) 9070 6916 / +(852) 3695 5266
- ENDS –
About The Man Asian Literary Prize
The Man Asian Literary Prize was founded in 2007. It is an annual literary award given to the best novel by an Asian writer, either written in English or translated into English, and published in the previous calendar year. The judges choose a longlist of 10 to 15 titles announced in December, followed by a shortlist of 5 to 6 titles announced in January, and a winner is awarded in March. The winning author is awarded USD 30,000 and the translator (if any) USD 5,000.
About Man
Man is a world-leading alternative investment management business. It has expertise in a wide range of liquid investment styles including managed futures, equity, credit and convertibles, emerging markets, global macro and multi-manager, combined with powerful product structuring, distribution and client service capabilities. As at 31 March 2012, Man managed USD59.0 billion.
The original business was founded in 1783. Today, Man is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a member of the FTSE 100 Index with a market capitalisation of around USD3.4 billion. Man is a signatory to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). Man also supports many awards, charities and initiatives around the world. Man sponsored literary prizes are the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize, the Lost Man Booker Prize and the Man Asian Literary Prize.
Man sponsored literary prizes are the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize, the Lost Man Booker Prize and the Man Asian Literary Prize.
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March 15, 2012 Conrad Hong Kong
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The Strand
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00pfhrp/The_Strand_15_03_2012/
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Photo Credit: Johnny Gi
HONG KONG, 15 March 2012 – Kyung-sook Shin has tonight become the first woman to win the Man Asian Literary Prize, Asia’s most prestigious award for writers, for her novel ‘Please Look After Mom’.
The South Korean novelist attended the black tie Prize Dinner at The Conrad Hotel in Hong Kong to receive the award of US$30,000. The translator of the novel, Chi-Young Kim also received US$5,000.
The win is the first for a South Korean writer, and ‘Please Look After Mom’ is the first novel by a South Korean to make it to the Man Asian Literary Prize shortlist in the Prize’s five year history.
‘Please Look After Mom’ is a deeply moving story of a family’s search for their mother, who goes missing one afternoon amid the crowds of the Seoul Station subway. It offers the reader an insight into traditional family life in contemporary South Korea and has already sold 1.93m copies in South Korea alone – a country with a population of just under 50m people. Following the shortlisting, the novel is now set to be published in 32 countries.
90 books were submitted for the Prize in 2011 with a longlist of twelve being announced in October 2011 and an unprecedented shortlist of seven revealed in January – owing to the strength of Asian literature.
Chair of Judges, Razia Iqbal said, “Please Look After Mom’ is an incredibly moving portrait of what it means to be a mother, but also of the tradition and modernity of the family in South Korea. The novel is a sensitive exploration of the inner life of the family with a very dynamic narrative structure. The story is surprising in its complexity yet has a beating heart at the centre of it.”
Prof. David Parker, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Man Asian Literary Prize said, “’Please Look After Mom’ is a deeply moving, humane and intricately wrought book, at once culturally specific and universal. It is a book that will be loved everywhere.”
Kyung-sook Shin is the author of numerous works of fiction and is one of South Korea’s most widely read and acclaimed novelists. She has been honored with the Manhae Literature Prize, the Dong-in Literature Prize, and the Yi Sang Literary Prize, as well as France’s Prix de l’Inaperçu. ‘Please Look After Mom’ is her first book to appear in English.
A spokesperson for Weidenfeld & Nicolson, the UK Publishers of ‘Please Look After Mom’ reported that “Being shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize provided a large boost to our sales, especially in export territories, as well as renewed publicity at home and abroad.”
Kyung-sook Shin’s agent, Joseph Lee of Korea Literary Management, reports that, while prior to the announcement of the 2011 Shortlist most Korean readers were unfamiliar with the Man Asian Literary Prize, it has since “become a well-known and important literary award” in Korea.
Nominations for the 2012 Man Asian Literary Prize will open at the end of May to publishers of novels by Asian writers from 35 countries.
The Prize can be followed on Twitter at @MALPrize and #MALPrize11, as well as on Facebook at facebook.com/MALPrize
For press enquiries please contact Mr. Harrison Kelly: media@manasianliteraryprize.org +(852) 9070 6916 / +(852) 3695 5266
– ENDS –
About The Man Asian Literary Prize
The Man Asian Literary Prize was founded in 2007. It is an annual literary award given to the best novel by an Asian writer, either written in English or translated into English, and published in the previous calendar year. The judges choose a longlist of 10 to 15 titles announced in October, followed by a shortlist of 5 to 6 titles announced in January, and a winner is awarded in March. The winning author is awarded USD 30,000 and the translator (if any) USD 5,000.
About Man
Man is a world-leading alternative investment management business. It has expertise in a wide range of liquid investment styles including managed futures, equity, credit and convertibles, emerging markets, global macro and multi-manager, combined with powerful product structuring, distribution and client service capabilities. At 31 December 2011, Man manages USD58.4 billion.
The original business was founded in 1783. Today, Man Group plc is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a member of the FTSE 100 Index, with a market capitalisation of around USD3.5 billion.
Man is a signatory to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) and a member of the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and the FTSE4Good Index. Man also supports many awards, charities and initiatives around the world.
Man sponsored literary prizes are the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize, the Lost Man Booker Prize and the Man Asian Literary Prize.
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