It’s time for the Gratiaen
A longlist of eight authors has been announced for the 31st Gratiaen Prize. They are: Pasan Jayasinghe for ‘Passing Return’, Jehan Aloysius for ‘Crossing the Line’, Ramya Jirasinghe for ‘Father Cabraal’s Recipe for Love Cake’, E.M. Tennakoon for ‘Footnotes of a Protest’, Selvi Sachithanandam for ‘Gnanam’, Vihanga Perera for ‘Students and Rebels’, Richard Simon for ‘Thomia’ and Lal Medawattegedara for ‘When Ghosts Die’.
The panel of judges for the 2023 Gratiaen Prize comprises Dr Anthony Joseph, an award-winning poet, author and musician from the UK who chairs the jury, Dr Ruvani Ranasinha, a Professor of Literature at King’s College London, and Angeline Ondaatjie, a keen supporter of the arts who joins the jury as an informed reader.
The shortlist announcement will be on April 29, 2024, and the grand award of the Gratiaen Prize on June 1, 2024.
In a joint statement, Gratiaen co-chairs Nafeesa Amiruddeen and Nisreen Jafferjee said, “The Gratiaen Trust would like to congratulate the authors who have been selected for the long list. This year we are pleased to note the wide range of genres and themes that were represented in the entries. We are also delighted to bring together a panel of judges that combine international experience with Sri Lankan insights. Each of our judges brings to the table unique perspectives and experience thereby raising the bar for creative excellence. ”
Dr. Anthony Joseph F.R.S.L., is a celebrated Trinidad-born poet, novelist, academic, and musician. His 2022 collection ‘Sonnets for Albert’ won the T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry 2022 and the OCM BOCAS Prize for Caribbean Poetry. A King’s College London lecturer, his illustrious career spans multiple poetry collections, novels and albums.
Dr. Ruvani Ranasinha, is a Professor at King’s College London with expertise in postcolonial literature and theory, especially South Asian diaspora literature. Dr Ranasinha received her PhD from the University of Oxford and is the author of ‘South Asian Writers in Twentieth-Century Britain: Culture in Translation’ (Oxford University Press, 2007), and ‘Contemporary Diasporic South Asian Women’s Fiction: Gender, Narration and Globalisation’ (Palgrave 2016). She is also the lead editor of ‘South Asians Shaping the Nation, 1870-1950: A Sourcebook’ (Manchester University Press, 2012).
Angeline Ondaatjie has a three-decade career in tourism and finance, and pursued her passion for literature and the arts by studying Comparative World Literature at both Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA. She serves on the Education Council of MIT and is a Country Advisor to Princeton Asia.
See also www.gratiaen.com.