Literary Prizes

White Pine Press in Buffalo, NY, has announced the first winner of its newly-established Cliff Becker Prize in Translation. A Hand Full of Water, a collection of poems by Bulgarian-born German writer Tzveta Sofronieva, will be published in a bilingual edition translated by Chantal Wright in fall 2012.

Renowned translator Willis Barnstone, the judge for this year's contest, stated: “Tzveta Sofronieva’s poetry sparkles...Her A Hand Full of Water is the most compelling volume in German verse since the work of Ingeborg Bachman and Hans Magnus Enzensberger....The lucent version by Chantal Wright captures the verve and fluid images of Sofornieva’s poetry....In the best sense her translation stands as an original book of poetry.”

The Hotlist Prize of the Independents was awarded during this year's Frankfurt Book Fair, at the Sinkkasten Arts Club on October 14. Author Charlotte Roche und der Freitag publisher Jakob Augstein served as moderators of the awards ceremony.

Since 2009 the Hotlist of the 10 best books published by German independent houses is chosen annually by the public and a jury. The jury then names one of these titles to receive the 5,000 € Hotlist Prize. This year's award went to the Frankfurter Verlagsanstalt for Nino Haratischwili's novel, Mein sanfter Zwilling, "a fatal love story between two people who define each other's existence and yet who continually seek to go their separate ways."

In addition, 2011 marks the awarding of the first Melusine Huss Prize, chosen by German booksellers. Stroemfeld Verlag received a 4,000 € voucher toward future printing costs, presented for Peter Kurzeck's novel Vorabend, the fifth volume of his autobiographical chronicle, Das alte Jahrhundert.

One of the last award ceremonies at this year's Frankfurt Book Fair took place late Saturday afternoon in the Comic Center: the Sondermann Prize. Awards in six categories, four chosen by popular vote, were announced from a slate of best-selling comics and graphic novels as reported by booksellers.

This year's Best Comic Published in Germany went to Isabel Kreitz and Peer Meter for their graphic novel, Haarmann, named for the real-life serial killer who enticed his 24 victims to his apartment and then did gruesome things to them -- before and after he murdered them. Kreitz's drawings recreate 1920s Hannover in the finest detail and author Peer Meter's text reveals the corruption at the heart of the Haarmann scandal. It turns out that the serial killer was an informant for the Hannover police, and could have been stopped in his tracks years earlier.

Anike Hage won the German Manga Sondermann for her version of Gudrun Pausewang's classic novel, Die Wolke, and David Füleki received the Web Sondermann for Best Internet Comic with his "Entoman. Serial Sausage Slaughter". Asja Wiegand was named Best Newcomer and Eugen Egner carried home this year's Bernd Pfarr-Sondermann for Comic Art for his complete work, the latter two prizes being the only of the Sondermanns selected by jury.

The Goethe-Institut New York Library has titles by Isabel Kreitz, Peer Meter, and Anike Hage for loan.

Two major literary prizes were recently announced: the Rheingau Literatur Preis, awarded to Austrian novelist Josef Haslinger, and the Hannah-Arendt-Preis, which this year goes to German-Iranian novelist Navid Kermani.

The Rheingau Literatur Preis comes not only with a € 10,000 purse, but with a cellar's worth of Rheingauer wine, 111 bottles to be exact. Josef Haslinger, who also serves as current director of the Leipzig Literaturinstitut, receives the award on September 25 for his novel Jáchymov (S. Fischer Verlag, 2011). Jáchymov is based on true events involving the Czech national hockey team, which after two world championships was accused by the Czechoslovakian government of subversive activities and sentenced to the labor camp of the Jáchymov uranian mines.

The Hannah-Arendt-Preis, awarded by the Bremen Senate and the Heinrich Böll Foundation, goes this year to orientalist and author Navid Kermani. The jury stated: "Like Denis Diderot and Hannah Arendt, who considered Jews to be the link between the nations of Europe, Navid Kermani sees Muslim immigrants of today as mediators between the states of Europe." Kermani's most recent novel, Dein Name, appears next week with Hanser Verlag

You will find titles by both authors in our library.

Two major German-language literary prizes were announced over the weekend. In Klagenfurt, Austria, the 2011 Ingeborg-Bachmann-Preis and its 25,000 euro award went to Austrian Maja Haderlap, following a reading of "Im Kessel", a chapter from her debut novel, Engel des Vergessens, to be published this month by Wallstein Verlag. The novel relates the story of a village of Slovene Carinthians who offered resistance to the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War.

Meanwhile in Cologne, the Heinrich-Böll-Preis, awarded by the city of Cologne in honor of its native son, goes, in its 31st year, to novelist Ulrich Peltzer, who in the judgement of the jury is a "patient and sensitive guide to social change in the Federal Republic of Germany." The award and its 20,000 euro purse will be presented to Peltzer at Cologne's City Hall on December 2. Among the author's recent titles are Bryant Park (2002) and Teil der Lösung (2007).

Jan Peter Bremer has won the Alfred-Döblin-Preis for his work-in-progress, Der amerikanische Investor, which Boersenblatt describes as a "Schriftstellerfamilienkatastrophenroman."

Funded by Günter Grass and awarded by the Berliner Akademie der Künste and the Literarisches Collquium Berlin (LCB), the prize was announced on May 29, following readings by 6 short-listed authors chosen by the jury from 500 entrants. Jury and public, this year joined by Günter Grass, discussed the merits of the 6 excerpts and the jury then came to its final decision. Grass presented Jan Peter Bremer with the award, which carries a 12,000 € purse.

Bremer's novel is written as a German author's attempt to address the American investor who has bought the dilapidated Berlin building the writer and his family call home, but each try at a suitable salutation repeatedly returns him to his desperate situation. The novel will be published in August by Berliner Verlag.