Tokarczuk wins 2018 Man Booker International Prize

Polish author Olga Tokarczuk has won the 2018 Man Booker International Prize for Flights (trans by Jennifer Croft, Text).

Tokarczuk and Croft will each receive £25,000 (A$44,330), as well as a further £1000 (A$1770) for being shortlisted. Each of the other shortlisted authors and translators will also receive £1000.

Chosen from a shortlist of six, Flights is a novel of linked fragments, from the 17th century to the present day, connected by themes of travel and human anatomy.

Chair of judges Lisa Appignanesi described Tokarczuk as ‘a writer of wonderful wit, imagination and literary panache’. ‘In Flights, brilliantly translated by Jennifer Croft, by a series of startling juxtapositions she flies us through a galaxy of departures and arrivals, stories and digressions, all the while exploring matters close to the contemporary and human predicament—where only plastic escapes mortality.’

The Man Booker International Prize is awarded to a book translated into English. Prior to 2016, the prize was awarded biennially to a body of work.

For more information about the prize, see the Man Booker website.

Category: International news