One is The Books of Jacob by Nobel Prize-inning writer Olga Tokarczuk. A highly-acclaimed work, it was earlier longlisted for the 2022 International Booker Prize, and was included among the best books of 2021 by The Guardian, The Times and The Economist.
It was published by Fitzcarraldo Editions in the UK and by Riverhead in the United States, in a translation by Jennifer Croft.
Often referred to as Tokarczuk’s opus magnum, The Books of Jacob runs to more than 1,100 pages. Set in the mid-18th century, it is about a charismatic self-proclaimed messiah, Jacob Frank, a young Jew who travels through the Hapsburg and Ottoman empires.
The other Polish book in the race for the EBRD Literature Prize is According to Her by Maciej Hen, a man of many talents who is active as a writer, translator, journalist and cameraman.
First published in Poland in 2004, According to Her is a book-length interview with the Mother of God, which creates a new, fresh retelling of the story forming the basis of Judeo-Christian cultures.
The Times critic Antonia Senior says in a review: “Written with wonderful language, strong feminist tones and a startling richness of detail about Jewish customs, this is, above all, a book of surprises."
According to Her was published by Holland House Books in a translation by Anna Błasiak.
The other books shortlisted for the EBRD Literature Prize are by authors from the Czech Republic, Lebanon, Slovakia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey and Ukraine.
The EBRD Literature Prize is awarded to the year’s best work of literary fiction translated into English, originally written in any language of the EBRD’s regions where it currently invests, and published for the first time by a European publisher.
Theprize is worth EUR 20,000 and is equally divided between the winning author and translator. The two runners-up and their translators receive a prize of EUR 4,000 each.
(mk/gs)