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New York inspired tales win US National Book Awards
Source: Agencies |
November 19, 2009, Thursday
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A novel about life in New York City in the 1970s and a biography of US tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt were among the winners at the United States 60th annual National Book Awards yesterday.
Colum McCann won the fiction award with "Let the Great World Spin," published by Random House, while "The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt," by T.J. Stiles and published by Alfred A. Knopf, won the nonfiction award.
"From 10 ordinary lives he crafts an indelibly hallucinatory portrait of a decaying New York City," the judges said of Irish-born McCann.
Stiles traced Vanderbilt's life from his birth in New York to the creation of his transport empire and family dynasty.
"Stiles captures Cornelius Vanderbilt as a person and as a force who shaped the transportation revolution, all but reinvented unbridled American capitalism, and left his mark not only all over New York City but, for better or worse, all over our economic landscape," the judges said.
Phillip Hoose won the Young People's Literature award for "Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice," published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
The book tells the true story of Colvin, who was a teenager in 1955 when she refused to give up her seat to white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama -- nine months before Rosa Parks took the same stand. But instead of being celebrated as Parks was, Colvin was jailed.
"Because of this woman, our lives have changed," said Hoose, as he accepted his award with Colvin by his side.
GORE VIDAL HONORED
The National Book Award for Poetry was awarded to Keith Waldrop for "Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy," published by University of California Press.
Past National Book Award winners include John Updike, Philip Roth and Ralph Ellison. In 2009, 193 publishers submitted 1,129 books for prizes.
There were five finalists in each category and each winner gets US$10,000. To be eligible, the books had to be published in the United States between Dec. 1, 2008 and Nov. 30, 2009 and written by a US citizen.
The Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters was awarded to Gore Vidal, whose 1948 novel "The City and the Pillar" was one of the first explicitly gay novels in American fiction.
The Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community went to Dave Eggers, co-founder of 826 Valencia, a nonprofit youth writing and tutoring center.
"The Complete Stories" by Flannery O'Connor was named the best fiction book of all the National Book Award winners from the past 60 years. It was chosen through an online poll answered by more than 10,000 people.
Despite the US recession, The Association of American Publishers said this week that US book sales to the end of September were up 3.6 percent to US$1.26 billion compared with the same period last year.
Colum McCann won the fiction award with "Let the Great World Spin," published by Random House, while "The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt," by T.J. Stiles and published by Alfred A. Knopf, won the nonfiction award.
"From 10 ordinary lives he crafts an indelibly hallucinatory portrait of a decaying New York City," the judges said of Irish-born McCann.
Stiles traced Vanderbilt's life from his birth in New York to the creation of his transport empire and family dynasty.
"Stiles captures Cornelius Vanderbilt as a person and as a force who shaped the transportation revolution, all but reinvented unbridled American capitalism, and left his mark not only all over New York City but, for better or worse, all over our economic landscape," the judges said.
Phillip Hoose won the Young People's Literature award for "Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice," published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
The book tells the true story of Colvin, who was a teenager in 1955 when she refused to give up her seat to white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama -- nine months before Rosa Parks took the same stand. But instead of being celebrated as Parks was, Colvin was jailed.
"Because of this woman, our lives have changed," said Hoose, as he accepted his award with Colvin by his side.
GORE VIDAL HONORED
The National Book Award for Poetry was awarded to Keith Waldrop for "Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy," published by University of California Press.
Past National Book Award winners include John Updike, Philip Roth and Ralph Ellison. In 2009, 193 publishers submitted 1,129 books for prizes.
There were five finalists in each category and each winner gets US$10,000. To be eligible, the books had to be published in the United States between Dec. 1, 2008 and Nov. 30, 2009 and written by a US citizen.
The Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters was awarded to Gore Vidal, whose 1948 novel "The City and the Pillar" was one of the first explicitly gay novels in American fiction.
The Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community went to Dave Eggers, co-founder of 826 Valencia, a nonprofit youth writing and tutoring center.
"The Complete Stories" by Flannery O'Connor was named the best fiction book of all the National Book Award winners from the past 60 years. It was chosen through an online poll answered by more than 10,000 people.
Despite the US recession, The Association of American Publishers said this week that US book sales to the end of September were up 3.6 percent to US$1.26 billion compared with the same period last year.
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