Location Dublin, Ireland First awarded 1996 | Reward(s) €100,000 | |
Awarded for a novel written in English or translated into English Presented by Dublin City Public Libraries and Archive Former name(s) International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award | ||
The International DUBLIN Literary Award (Irish: Duais Liteartha Idirnáisiúnta Bhaile Átha Chliath) is an international literary award awarded each year for a novel written in English or translated into English. It aims to promote excellence in world literature and is solely sponsored by the City of Dublin, Ireland.
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At €100,000, the award is one of the richest literary prizes in the world. If the winning book is a translation (as it has been 8 times), the prize is divided between the writer and the translator, with the writer receiving €75,000 and the translator €25,000.
Nominations are submitted by public libraries worldwide – over 400 library systems in 177 countries worldwide are invited to nominate books each year – from which the shortlist and the eventual winner are selected by an international panel of judges (which changes each year).
The most recent winner of the award is Akhil Sharma for Family Life.
Qualification
The prize is open to novels written in any language and by authors of any nationality, provided the work has been published in English or English translation.
The year an award is given is post-dated by two years from the date of publication. Thus, to win an award in 2007, the work must have been published in 2005. If it is an English translation, the work must have been published in its original language in the same calendar year.
Process
Dublin City Public Libraries seek nominations from public libraries from major cities across the world. The longlist is announced in October or November of each year, and the shortlist (up to 10 titles) is announced in March or April of the year following. The longlist and shortlist are chosen by an international panel of judges which rotates each year. Allen Weinstein was the non-voting chair of the panel from 1996 to 2003. Eugene R. Sullivan is the non-voting chair from 2004 to the current date. The winner of the award is announced each June.
History
The Award was established in 1994 as the "International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award", a joint initiative of Dublin City Council and the American productivity company IMPAC, which had its European headquarters in Dublin. James Irwin, president of IMPAC established the prize money at €100,000. A trust fund was established to pay for the award and its maintenance. The Award has been administered by Dublin City Public Libraries since its inception. IMPAC went defunct in the late-2000s when its founder and president James Irwin died in 2009. In late 2013, the trust fund became exhausted and there was no money left to run the Award. Dublin City Council agreed to step in and continue funding the Award under the same brand name of the now-defunct company while seeking a new sponsor. It was reported in 2015 that Dublin City Council paid in 2015 €100,000 for the prize plus €80,250 in administration costs. The award was renamed the International DUBLIN Literary Award in November 2015.
Describing the Award as "the most eclectic and unpredictable of the literary world's annual gongs", Michelle Pauli posed the question in relation to the longlist for the 2004 edition, "Where would you find Michael Dobbs and Tony Parsons up against Umberto Eco and Milan Kundera for a €100,000 prize?"