Harrower wins 2015 Voss Literary Prize

Elizabeth Harrower has won the 2015 Voss Literary Prize for her novel In Certain Circles (Text).

The Voss Literary Prize is awarded to the best novel published in Australia in the previous year, and is managed by the Australian University Heads of English, the peak body for the study of English at Australian universities.

Harrower’s novel was selected from a shortlist of six, which also included: The Tribe (Michael Mohammed Ahmad, Giramondo), The Eye of the Sheep (Sophie Laguna, A&U), A Million Windows (Gerard Murnane, Giramondo), Merciless Gods (Christos Tsiolkas, A&U) and To Name Those Lost (Rohan Wilson, A&U).

Harrower’s publisher Text said in a blog post that the award was ‘brilliant recognition for an author whose work almost disappeared from our literary landscape’. In Certain Circles is Harrower’s fifth novel, and was withdrawn from publication in the 1970s before being published by Text in 2014.

This year’s award was judged by Brigitta Olubas, Helen Groth, Brenda Walker, David Ellison and Amanda Nettelbeck.

The inaugural winner of the prize in 2014 was Fiona McFarlane’s The Night Guest (Penguin).

For more information, visit the prize website here.

Category: Local news