US author wins Dylan Thomas prize for first novel
AN AMERICAN poet, novelist and essayist has been announced as the winner of this year’s Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize.
The award, which is one of the world’s largest literary prizes for young writers, has been given to Patricia Lockwood for her debut novel, No One Is Talking About This.
Also shortlisted for the 2021 Booker Prize and the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021, Lockwood’s novel, which is published by Bloomsbury Publishing, unpacks internet culture and its impact on the individual psyche with immense sensitivity and surreptitious humour.
Lockwood was awarded the prestigious £20,000 prize at a ceremony at Swansea University’s Great Hall yesterday ahead of International Dylan Thomas Day tomorrow.
Chair of judges Namita Gokhale, said: “No One Is Talking About This is a vital reflection on online culture today. A deeply timely winner, Patricia Lockwood is the voice of a generation of new writers who grew up under the constant pressures of real-time news and social media.
“It is a searingly witty and innovative take on modern-day internet culture and the experience of family trauma in the modern world. The book’s flow of consciousness, almost diarylike in quality, is remarkably deft at capturing the psychological impact which simultaneous alienation and ‘groupthink’ life online has on us as individuals.
“Lockwood is an astonishing and wholly original new voice. We are delighted that the jury of the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize decided on her debut novel as its choice for the 2022 prize. We cannot wait to see what comes next from this uncompromising talent.”
Welsh author Rachel Trezise, a former winner of the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize, describes Lockwood’s debut novel as “a poignant, witty and genre-defying portrayal of the absurdity of being ‘extremely online’ as well as an urgent rumination on the necessity of human connection”.
Novelist Alan Bilton felt the book was “inventive, smart, and hyper-self-aware”, describing Lockwood as “the patron saint of digital natives, an explorer who has navigated the Twittersphere and knows: Here There Be Monsters”.
The other titles shortlisted for the prize were A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam (Granta Books), Auguries of a Minor God by Nidhi Zak/aria Eipe (Faber), The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris (Tinder Press/ Headline Publishing Group), Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson (Viking Press/penguin General) and Filthy Animals by Brandon Taylor (Daunt Books Publishing).
Lockwood joins an illustrious list of writers to have been awarded this prestigious prize, including Raven Leilani, Bryan Washington, Guy Gunaratne, Kayo Chingonyi, Fiona Mcfarlane and Max Porter.
The American author has penned four books, with No One Is Talking About This becoming an international bestseller translated into 20 languages.
Her 2017 memoir Priestdaddy won the Thurber Prize for American Humour and was named one of the Guardian’s 100 best books of the 21st century. She also has two poetry collections, Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals (2014) and Balloon Pop Outlaw Black (2012).
Lockwood’s work has appeared in the New York Times, the New Yorker and the London Review of Books, where she is a contributing editor.
Launched in 2006, the Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize is one of the most prestigious awards for young writers, aimed at encouraging raw creative talent worldwide.
Awarded for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged 39 or under, the prize celebrates the international world of fiction in all its forms including poetry, novels, short stories and drama.
One of the most influential, internationally-renowned writers of the mid-20th century, the prize invokes Dylan Thomas’ memory to support the writers of today and nurture the talents of tomorrow.