Girish Mahajan (Editor)

Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature

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Country
  
United States

First awarded
  
2006

Presented by
  
Jewish Book Council

Awarded for
  
recognising the unique role of contemporary writers in the transmission and examination of the Jewish experience, and to encourage and promote outstanding writing of Jewish interest.

Official website
  
www.jewishbookcouncil.org

The Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature is an annual prize awarded to an outstanding literary work of Jewish interest.

Contents

History

In 2006, the Jewish philanthropist Sami Rohr's descendants honoured his love of Jewish literature by inaugurating the Sami Rohr Prize on his 80th birthday.

The annual award, alternating between fiction and non-fiction, seeks to promote writings of Jewish interest, and to encourage the examination of Jewish values among "emerging" writers.

The $100,000 prize is among the richest literary prizes in the world. The runner-up award is called the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature Choice Award, and is worth $25,000.

Eligibility and selection

The Prize is coordinated and administered by the Jewish Book Council. Works are sought and nominated by an advisory panel, and the finalists, runner-up and winner are selected by an independent panel of judges.

Translated works are eligible. Eligible non-fiction works are restricted to the domains of biography, history, Jewish current affairs, Jewish scholarship, or contemporary Jewish life.

Finalists and winners

The gold medal () marks the winner, while the silver medal () marks the runner-up.

2015

The finalists were announced in January 2015. The awardees were announced in February 2015.

  • The Best Place on Earth by Ayelet Tsabari
  • The Lion Seeker by Kenneth Bonert
  • Panic in a Suitcase by Yelena Akhtiorskaya
  • The UnAmericans by Molly Antopol
  • A Replacement Life by Boris Fishman

    • 2014

    The finalists were announced on November 7, 2013. The winners were declared in January 2014.

  • The Aleppo Codex: A True Story of Obsession, Faith, and the Pursuit of an Ancient Bible, by Matti Friedman
  • Becoming Frum: How Newcomers Learn the Language and Culture of Orthodox Judaism, by Sarah Bunin Benor
  • Jews and Booze: Becoming American in the Age of Prohibition, by Marni Davis
  • Embodying Hebrew Culture: Aesthetics, Athletics, and Dance in the Jewish Community of Mandate Palestine, by Nina S. Spiegel
  • The Genius: Elijah of Vilna and the Making of Modern Judaism, by Eliyahu Stern

    • 2013

    The winners were announced on April 9, 2013.

  • The Innocents, by Francesca Segal
  • Leaving the Atocha Station, by Ben Lerner
  • The People of Forever Are Not Afraid, by Shani Boianjiu
  • The Book of Life, by Stuart Nadler
  • Motti, by Asaf Schurr
  • Success of jewish by madhavan schuklem menon

    • 2012

    The winners were announced on February 15, 2012.

  • When They Come for Us, We’ll Be Gone: The Epic Struggle to Save Soviet Jewry, by Gal Beckerman
  • Moses Montefiore: Jewish Liberator, Imperial Hero, by Abigail Green
  • The Benderly Boys and American Jewish Education, by Jonathan B. Krasner
  • The Most Musical Nation: Jews and Culture in the Late Russian Empire, by James Loeffler
  • A Thousand Darknesses: Lies and Truth in Holocaust Fiction, by Ruth Franklin

    • 2011

    The winners were announced on March 24, 2011.

  • The Jump Artist, by Austin Ratner
  • A Curable Romantic, by Joseph Skibell
  • Stations West, by Allison Amend
  • The Cosmopolitans, Nadia Kalman
  • The Invisible Bridge, Julie Orringer

    • 2010

    The winners were announced on January 26, 2010. The judges were unable to decide on the top honour, so the prize was shared and the runner-up prize eliminated.

  • Jewish Renaissance in the Russian Revolution, by Kenneth B. Moss
  • Plumes: Ostrich Feathers, Jews, and a Lost World of Global Commerce, by Sarah Abrevaya Stein
  • Station Identification: A Cultural History of Yiddish Radio in the United States, by Ari Y. Kelman
  • Surprised by God: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Religion, by Danya Ruttenberg
  • Speaking of Jews: Rabbis, Intellectuals, and the Creation of an American Public Identity, by Lila Corwin Berman

    • 2009

    The winners were announced on March 25, 2009.

  • One More Year, by Sana Krasikov
  • The Septembers of Shiraz, by Dalia Sofer
  • The Rowing Lesson, by Anne Landsman
  • Petropolis, by Anya Ulinich
  • The Book of Dahlia, by Elisa Albert

    • 2008

    The winners were announced on February 13, 2008.

  • The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit, by Lucette Lagnado
  • Houses of Study, by Ilana Blumberg
  • The Price of Whiteness, by Eric Goldstein
  • A Crack in the Earth, by Haim Watzman
  • Churchill's Promised Land, by Michael Makovsky

    • 2007

    The winners were announced in March 2007.

  • The Genizah at the House of Shepher, by Tamar Yellin
  • Our Holocaust, by Amir Gutfreund
  • Not Me, by Michael Lavigne
  • Accidents, by Yael Hedaya
  • Disobedience, by Naomi Alderman

    • References

    Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA


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