Wingate Prize 2010
First biography of a Palestinian Writer (in any language) scoops Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize 2010
MY HAPPINESS BEARS NO RELATION TO HAPPINESS: A POET’S LIFE IN THE PALESTINIAN CENTURY by Adina Hoffman (Yale University Press) has won the prize dubbed ‘the Jewish Booker’.
This is an historic day for Jewish-Palestinian relations. The story of Palestine is the story of us all, ” said Editor of the Jewish Quarterly, Rachel Lasserson.
Commenting on the winning book Anne Karpf, chair of the judging panel, said:
“All four judges fell in love with this year’s winning book, ‘Adina Hoffman’s ‘My Happiness Bears No Relation to Happiness’. Hoffman’s eloquent and moving account of the life of Palestinian poet Taha Mohammed Ali, the first biography of a Palestinian writer in English, brilliantly recreates Palestinian life in the 1920s. In places it reads almost like a detective story as Hoffman painfully excavates the truth about how all traces of the Palestinian village of Saffuriya were erased and replaced by the Israeli village of Tzippori. But this is ultimately an uplifting book, combining meticulous research with literary sensitivity and a deep humanity: a beautifully written portrait of lived resistance. You read it and you marvel at human resilience and creativity.”
Former winners include Amos Oz, David Grossman, Zadie Smith, Imre Kertesz, Oliver Sacks, WG Sebald, Etgar Keret and Fred Wander. This years judging panel was Robert Cassen, Joseph Finlay, Naomi Gryn and Anne Karpf.
So What?: New and Selected Poems by Taha Muhammad Ali (translated by Peter Cole, Yahya Hijazi and Gabriel Levin) is published in the UK by Bloodaxe books
The shortlist
Commenting on the shortlist, Chairman of the Judging panel Anne Karpf said: “We had — as book prize juries famously do — a full and frank discussion. To get onto the shortlist a book needed at least two passionate advocates. The four that emerged are all powerful works that leave you with a different view of the world. Of the two novels, both of them set in pre- and post-war Europe, one is the baroque, unflinching story of a woman’s survival (of sorts) despite the depredations of a damaged family and damaging culture; the other, the moving tale of a modernist house whose inhabitants’ hopes for a better future are challenged by the tragic times in which they live. Our two non-fiction choices both ask searching questions about the Middle East: one, controversially, about Israel’s founding national story and its Biblical origins; the other, the first ever biography of any Palestinian poet, beautifully illuminating the Palestinian experience. Together these four books make up a literary feast.”
This is the only UK prize to recognise writing by Jewish and non-Jewish authors, which stimulates an interest in themes of Jewish concern while appealing to the general reader.
Former winners include Amos Oz, David Grossman, Zadie Smith, Imre Kertesz, Oliver Sacks, WG Sebald, Etgar Keret and Fred Wander.
This is the only UK prize to recognise writing by Jewish and non-Jewish authors, which stimulates an interest in themes of Jewish concern while appealing to the general reader. Former winners include Amos Oz, David Grossman, Zadie Smith, Imre Kertesz, Oliver Sacks, WG Sebald, and Etgar Keret
Notes to Editors
Established in 1977 by the late Harold Hyam Wingate, the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prize is now in its 31st year. The winner of the 2009 prize will receive £4,000.
Jewish and non-Jewish authors resident in the UK, British Commonwealth, Europe and Israel are eligible. Books submitted must be in English, either originally or in translation.
The Jewish Quarterly is the foremost Jewish literary and cultural journal in the English language. This year it celebrates 56 years of publication.
The Harold Hyam Wingate Charitable Foundation is a private grant-giving institution, established over forty years ago. In addition to supporting the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Literary Prizes, it has also organised and supported the Wingate Scholarships.
Judges
· Anne Karpf is a writer, sociologist and award-winning journalist who writes for The Guardian, broadcasts regularly on Radios 3 and 4, and teaches at London Metropolitan University. Her books include the family memoir The War After: Living with the Holocaust (recently republished by Faber Finds) and The Human Voice: The Story of a Remarkable Talent (Bloomsbury). She is co-editor of A Time to Speak Out: Independent Jewish Voices on Israel, Zionism and Jewish Identity (Verso).
· Naomi Gryn is a writer, broadcaster and filmmaker. Television documentaries include The Sabbath Bride, Chasing Shadows, The Star, and The Castle & The Butterfly. A former chairman of Society of Authors’ Broadcasting Group, she has written and presented a number of radio documentaries for BBC, including A Strange Legacy (Radio 4), Next Year In Jerusalem (Radio 2), Inside The New Yorker (Radio 4), and The Jews of India (World Service). Naomi co-authored and edited her father’s (Rabbi Hugo Gryn) memoirs, Chasing Shadows for Viking/Penguin.
· Joseph Finlay is a composer, pianist and a grassroots Jewish activist. He has co-founded, or been closely involved in Wandering Jews, Jewdas, Moishe House London, and the Open Talmud Project. Click here to listen Jason Solomons speaking to Joseph Finlay in a podcast by The Guardian
· Robert Cassen OBE is Visiting Professor at the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, London School of Economics. He was a Professorial Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies in Sussex, and Director of Queen Elizabeth House and Professor of Development Economics at Oxford. He served on the staff of DfID, the British High Commission in New Delhi, the World Bank, and the Brandt Commission and is the author of India: Population, Economy, Society; of Does Aid Work? (with associates); 21st Century India: Population, Economy, Human Development and the Environment; with Tim Dyson and Leela Visaria, and Tackling Low Educational Achievement: a Report for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation with Geeta Kingdon.
