In a month of surprises in the literary world, patron the Lord Mayor Gerry Breen unexpectedly announced Colum McCann as the recipient of the 2011 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award at the awards ceremony in Dublin in June.
Only days earlier, The Orange Prize for Fiction had been awarded to Téa Obreht for The Tiger’s Wife, becoming, at the age of 25, the youngest ever recipient of the prize. (See Tea Obreht Wins the 2011 Orange Prize for Fiction).
Both McCann’s Let the Great World Spin and Obreht’s debut novel beat more fancied works for the awards.
Colum McCann
Born in Dublin, currently based in New York City, Colum McCann began his career as a reporter for The Irish Press. A collection of short stories – Fishing in the Sloe-Black River (Picador) – was published in 1994 and which collected the prestigious Rooney Prize for Irish Literature: his first novel, Songdogs (Picador 1996), followed shortly after.
Moving from Ireland to Japan and then the US resulted in a gap of seven years before the publication of his second novel, The Side of Brightness (Picador 2003). But during this time, McCann’s short stories and articles appeared in, among others, The New Yorker, Paris Review, Granta, The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times, Die Zeit, La Republicca, Paris Match and The Times.
In 2003, he was named Esquire magazine's Writer of the Year for their Best and Brightest issue and, in 2009, McCann was awarded a Chevalier des arts et lettres by the French government.
A dual American Irish citizen, Colum teaches in the Creative Writing program at Hunter College, New York alongside fellow novelists Peter Carey and Nathan Englander.
Let the Great World Spin
Let the Great World Spin is McCann’s fifth novel.
Set against the backdrop of the tightrope walk between the incomplete towers of the World Trade Centre by Philippe Petit in 1974, the novel explores the intertwining lives of a number of New York residents.
A radical Irish monk in the Bronx battling his own demons; a 36 year-old prostitute and grandmother; an Upper East Side housewife mourning the loss of her son in Vietnam are just three of the novel’s many entangled protagonists providing a depth of understanding of everyday survival in 1970s New York.
Described by Jonathan Mahler in the New York Times as “One of the most electric, profound novels I have read in years”, Let the World Spin became a best-seller on four continents, collecting the 2009 National Book Award, the Prix Deauville, Amazon.com’s Book of the Year and the 2010 Ambassador Book Award.
The International IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize
First established in 1996, the IMPAC Dublin is the most lucrative in the world with prize money of €100,000. With nominations for the shortlist selected by libraries from around the world, it is also regarded as the most international of its kind.
Whilst the books must be available in English, nominations are accepted for books in translation from any language. The IMPAC Dublin is one of the few international awards that recognises the value of the translator. If the winning novel was not originally published in English, 25% of the prize money is presented to the translator.
Let the World Spin (published by Random House) received a record 14 nominations from libraries across the globe. Yet, in spite of this, Chinese-born, American-based Yiyun Li was the favourite to win the 2011 award for her debut novel The Vagrants, with master storyteller William Trevor a close second for his latest, Love and Summer. (See The International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award Shortlist Announced)
But, just as earlier in the month at The Orange Prize for Fiction, the IMPAC Dublin did not follow expectations. Instead, the judging panel presented the award to a book they described as a "remarkable literary work ... a genuinely 21st century novel that speaks to its time but is not enslaved by it.”
Sources
- Colum McCann website
- Random House website
- BBC, 'Irish author Colum McCann wins lucrative literary award', BBC website
Keith Lawrence - Published writer of articles in magazines, newspapers and websites, predominantly on culture, alongside ghostwriter/editor/copywriter.
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