With its £ 100,000 in prize money, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award affords writers a shot both at fame as well as considerable fortune. Established in 1996, the award has recognized the likes of Orhan Pamuk (2003), Colm Tóibín (2006) and most recently, Michael Thomas.
This year three Sri Lankans, nominated by the Colombo Public Library have been included in the long list. Manu Gunasena, Shehani Gomes and Ruana Rajepakse face some stiff competition, as 153 other authors, including Salman Rushdie, Aravind Adiga, Amitav Ghosh and Tony Morrison, are in the running. The nominations (three per library) come from 163 libraries across 123 cities and were translated from 18 different languages. Thirty three of these are first novels. A shortlist of no more than 10 titles will be announced on April 14, 2010.
The Prince by Manu Gunasena
The young man who is the main protagonist of Manu Gunasena’s novel The Prince appears to have much in common with the young Buddha. Both are Indian princes, born in the lap of luxury. Both renounce their rich inheritances to set out in search of something intangible. But, as Manu points out, he never uses the name Siddhartha to refer to his character.
Several other deviations from Buddhist tradition in the plot separate man from myth. Combing prose and poetry, the book tells of the prince’s search for the Stoic Stone and the omens that showed him the way.
The Prince marks the literary debut of the author who is also a Barrister-at-Law of the Inner Temple, England and Wales and was the editor both of the English Sunday newspaper the Weekend and the daily Sun. He declares himself honoured to be long listed for an international book award and humbled by the company he finds himself in. I do not dare entertain ambitions to win it, he said, suffice to say I am content being in the list at all.
The Garland of Fate by
Ruana
Rajepakse
Ruana is a lawyer by profession and writer of fiction by inclination. Though she practises full time, and has two professional books to her credit, the author spent several years researching and writing ‘The Garland of Fate’, a novel based on an incident from the Kanevera Jataka and published by Vijitha Yapa Publications.
The novel follows the lives of two sisters, daughters of a small farmer who gives them into very different lives – for one daughter he arranges a marriage to an ambitious merchant. The other he makes an apprentice to a wealthy city courtesan.
Then one day, a young man falls in with a gang of bandits, is captured and paraded through the streets.
The younger sister decides to intervene on his behalf and her decision sets in motion a chain of events that will change all their lives.
“I have always had a fascination for this period,” the author explained, adding that her story and her research “grew together” – with research showing her that some plotlines were not possible even as she found other unforeseen discoveries enhanced the storyline.
Learning to Fly by Shehani Gomes
When Shehani first heard she was nominated for the IMPAC Prize, she wasn’t sure whether or not there was supposed to be a ‘t’ at the end; but learning that Yasmine Goonaratne had previously been shortlisted convinced her of the honour the prize represented.
Her debut novel ‘Learning to Fly’ was shortlisted for the Gratiaen Prize in 2005 - “but what went into the Gratiaen was almost a raw version of what the book is today,” she said. After nearly three years of redrafts and tweaks, the novel was published in 2008.
Employing a combination of interior monologues, diary entries, letters, third person narration, and un-attributed dialogue, the novel follows the lives of three “estranged” young people. In the throes of adolescence, Kala, Dylan and Nadia learn from and triumph over love and loss.
Shehani, who dedicated the book to her surrogate sister and to her mother, says that slaving over her manuscript has improved her writing considerably and has left her far more self aware.
She works as a Management Consultant at a Colombo-based environmental finance firm.
|
E-mail