Omani author Jokha Alharthi has won this year’s Man Booker International Prize making her the first Arabic writer to do so.
Her novel ‘Celestial Bodies’ centres on the lives of three sisters and their families coming to terms with social changes in Oman.
According to BBC, the judges described it as “a richly imagined, engaging and poetic insight”. Alharthi shares the award of $63,000 (KES 6.3 million) with her translator, the American academic Marilyn Booth.
“I am thrilled that a window has been opened to the rich Arabic culture,” Alharthi told journalists after the ceremony at the Roundhouse in London. “Oman inspired me but I think international readers can relate to the human values in the book – freedom and love,” she added.
“It touches the subject of slavery. I think literature is the best platform to have this dialogue,” said Alharthi, who is the first female Omani novelist to be translated into English.
The chair of judges, historian Bettany Hughes, said the novel showed “delicate artistry and disturbing aspects of our shared history”. “The style is a metaphor for the subject, subtly resisting cliches of race, slavery and gender,” she added.
The Man Booker International Prize is an international literary award hosted in the United Kingdom. The introduction of the International Prize to complement the Man Booker Prize was announced in June 2004.
The Booker Prize for Fiction is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original novel written in the English language and published in the United Kingdom. The winner of the Booker Prize is generally assured international renown and success; therefore, the prize is of great significance for the book trade.
Alharthi has previously written two collections of short fiction, a children’s book and three novels in Arabic.
