Business Standard

29-year-old Dutch writer becomes youngest to win International Booker Prize

A 29-year-old Dutch writer has become the youngest author to win the International Booker Prize

29-year-old Dutch writer becomes youngest to win International Booker Prize

Representative Image

AP London

A 29-year-old Dutch writer has become the youngest author to win the International Booker Prize.

Marieke Lucas Rijneveld's The Discomfort of Evening, a dark story about a devout farming family in a strict Christian community in the rural Netherlands, was announced as the winner Wednesday.

Under the rules of the prize, the 50,000-pound ($66,000) award will be split between the author and translator Michele Hutchison, giving both equal recognition.

Ted Hodgkinson, who chaired a panel of judges, described the novel as a tender and visceral evocation of a childhood caught between shame and salvation. The International Booker Prize is awarded every year to a book of fiction in any language that is translated into English and published in the UK or Ireland.

 

The award is separate from the main Booker Prize, and aims to encourage more publishing and reading of quality fiction from around the world.

This year the judges considered 124 books, translated from 30 languages.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Don't miss the most important news and views of the day. Get them on our Telegram channel

First Published: Aug 27 2020 | 7:15 AM IST

Explore News