Five world regions are represented in this year’s 13 longlisted books for the Man Booker International Prize, which divides its award between translator and author.
he 13-title longlist for the 2018 Man Booker International Prize has been announced this afternoon in London (March 12), and features work from Germany, Taiwan, Iraq, Austria, Spain, France, South Korea, Argentina, Hungary, and Poland.
The Man Booker International Prize is a different award from the Man Booker Prize for Fiction, its better-known and older sister honor, which is this year celebrating its 50th anniversary.
The international prize was “evolved,” as Booker organizers like to say, several years ago, making the honor available on the basis of a single work rather than a body of work. This was instituted with the 2016 award to author Han Kang and translator Deborah Smith for The Vegetarian.
The international prize is arguably the world’s leading award for work translated into English, and has been influential in literature award circles for its formula that evenly divides its £50,000 purse (US$69,465) between author and translator.
Translator Frank Wynne has two titles on this year’s list, one from the French (Virginie Despentes’ Vernon Subutex 1), the other from Spanish (Javier Cercas’ The Imposter). The jury has drawn its longlist from a total of 108 titles.
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