International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award- Love It

Of all the Literary Awards that the Tragic covers, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award is one of his absolute favourites. The quality of works submitted, from librarians all over the world, is nothing less than exemplary.

Tragic likes librarians. They understand books and, although Tragic hasn't yet identified who submitted Ken Follet's lamentable World Without End, or Khaled Hossieni's much over-hyped A Thousand Splendid Suns to the list, he will forgive them as we all suffer temporary aberrations.

It was a delight, when a spare moment finally presented itself between the duller aspects of literary empire maintenance, to finally sit down with a strong cuppa and one of little Arabella's culinary experiments ("it weally is a Jam Drop Daddy!"), for a good trawl through this years long list. Yes, he realises that this may seem strange to some, but Tragic becomes the epitome of an Irish Setter in full majestic poise at the very thought of a good long list- and the Dublin is without doubt the very longest of longlists.

It is always nothing less than intimidating; this year is no exception. 146 writers have been nominated for prize. Worth 100,000 euro (us$125,00) it is the world's most valuable annual literary prize for a single work of fiction published in English and is a Dublin City Council initiative, in partnership with IMPAC. The nominations come from 157 libraries in 117 cities and 41 countries worldwide

Finest Moments
Last years winner, Rawi Hage's, DeNiro's Game, is a very fine read. Indeed, every winner back to David Malouf's, 1996 winner, Babylon, has provided the Tragic with some of his most enjoyable literary moments. Colm Tóibín, Orhan Pamuk, Tahar Ben Jelloun, Herta Muller and the admirable Nicola Barker have all been worthy winners. Tragic is currently re-reading Barker's 2000 winner, Wide Open. It is one of five on the go . One of those, the 2007 Dublin winner, Per Petterson's, Out Stealing Horses, now half finished, and not half-bad.

One of the delights of the prize is that it does the best job of any global award in including translated works. By the Tragic's count (never infallible), some twenty seven works on this years long list have been translated into English from their original languages. Bravo! We can only hope that they make the next stage otherwise their chances of finding their way onto the reading list are remote.

Tragic cannot deny that his reading over the years has been far too Western European-American-Irish-Australian- with a wee bit of Africa and South America Centric over the years. If only the school didn't keep asking for fees, someone paid him for his work, the sprogglings and Mrs T. didn't require daily feeding, the council left him alone and the Golden Acre started producing there would be more time to read.....


Pedigree List
The nominated novels include The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, winner of this year’s Pulitzer Prize, The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill , (published as Someone Knows My Name in the UK and Australia) winner of the 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize, and, Omega Minor, by Paul Verhaeghen, winner of the 2008 Independent Foreign Fiction Award.

Tragic tried very hard to empathise with the lived experience of an American-Dominican teenager in Oscar Wao, but failed miserably. The political and socio-economic critique inherent in the book were much more to his liking. Given the title is a play on Oscar Wilde it may well be a strong chance for the Dublin in a twist of literary irony.

There are many works in the running that have either won or have already been listed for some of the world's most prestigious prizes. The following is for my fellow Literary Award addicts only. Those who have a life, leave now. It's not too late. We must remember crew, at the end of the day it's just a list of books.

Anyhow, onward. Some of the stronger chances include:

Animal's People - Indra Sinha- Winner Commonwealth Writers Prize Winner Europe and East Asia. Booker Shortlist. Australia-Asia Literary Prize Longlist
Day - A.L. Kennedy. Winner UK Costa
Diary of A Bad Year- J.M. Coetzee- Australia-Asia Literary Prize Longlist. Shortlist NSW, Victorian and Queensland Premier's Prize.
Divisadero- Michael Ondjaatje Winner of the 2007 Canadian Govenor-Generals Fiction
Fieldwork- Mischa Berlinski- 2007 US National Book Award Shortlist
Girl Meets Boy: The Myth of Iphis - Ali Smith Winner Sundial Scottish Arts Council Award Landscape of Farewell- Alex Miller- Australia's Miles Franklin Shortlist. Commonwealth Writers Shortlist. NSW Premiers Shortlist
On Chesil Beach- Ian McKwen Galxy British Book of the Year Winner. 2007 Booker Shortlist
Soucouyant- David Chariandy- Giller and Commonwealth Writers Shortlists
The Beautiful Things that Heaven Bears (published as Children of the Revolution in the UK) by Dinaw Mengestu US National Book Award "5 Under 35" last year. Winner Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction (LA Times Awards). Winner 2007 UK Guardian First Book Award 2007. Dylan Thomas Shortlist
The Carhullan Army Sarah Hall- Winner 2007 John Llewellyn Rhys
The Hangman's Game, Karen King-Arbisal. Winner Best Book- Africa Commonwealth Writer's
The Indian Clerk- David Leavitt- Pen Faulkner Shortlist
The Gravediggers Daughter- Joyce Carol-Oates - National Book Critics Shortlist
The Reluctant Fundamentalist- Moshin Hamid. Winner Ainsfield-Wolfe. Booker,Australia -Asia literary Award and Commonwealth Writers Shortlists
The Road Home by Rose Tremain. Winner Orange Prize
The Time We Have Taken- Steve Carroll. Winner Miles Franklin.
The Yiddish Policemen's Union- Michael Chabon. Winner The Edgars, The Hugo, The California Book Awards. Shortlist BSFA Awards
Then We Came to an End- Joshua Ferris. 2007 Winner Hemmingway/Pen Award. National Book Award Shortlist
Tree of Smoke- Denis Johson- Winner 2007 USA National Book Award
The Trout Opera - Matthew Condon. Shortlist NSW & Queensland Premier's. Australia-Asia Longlist
What Was Lost- Catherine O' Flynn. Galaxy British Book Award Winner (newcomer). Winner Costa First Novel.
The Gathering- Ann Enright - 2007 Booker Winner

Best Chances- Any Ones Guess
What a job for the judges, lucky souls, to get the full 146 down to a short list of ten or so. I haven't mentioned other listees such Philip Roth, Don de Lillo, Doris Lessing, Elizabeth Hay, Michael Winter, Nicholas Shakespeare, Pat Barker, Sebastian Faulks, Christopher Koch , Annie Dillard, and Haruki Murakami!

Tragic has read a mere 23 of the books listed- so far too difficult to make any predictions at this early stage. Like school exams of old he can but hope that he will have read at least half-a dozen of the final short list by the time June 2009 comes around.

Of those he has read Carhullan Army, Animal's People, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Tree of Smoke and On Chesil Beach passed muster, but he suspects that there are weightier works lurking in the depths of the list. For those who really really need to know, the full list is here and a list of nominating libraries here.

The Dublin City Council will announce the short list on 2nd April 2009 and the winning novel will be revealed by the Lord Mayor of Dublin on 11th June 2009.