Man Booker International Prize 2019 Longlist

The Man Booker International Prize 2019 Longlist was just announced a couple of hours ago!
I told you at the beginning of March that I was going to be part of the Shadow Panel Judges (with these amazing people!) this year, so I couldn’t wait to see the list of books selected!
I was part of the shadow panel back in 2015, and it was such an amazing experience, that I thought it was time to try again. In 2015, I discovered so many unusual and fascinating authors that I wouldn’t have read otherwise.

This year longlist seems very promising along these same lines, as it contains almost none of the books we thought would be there! I have heard only of a few authors, but have not read any of these books yet, though a couple were already on my TBR!

So here you go:

#MBI2019

Author (Original Language –Country/territory),
translator, title (publisher/imprint)

Jokha Alharthi (Arabic / Omani), Marilyn Booth, Celestial Bodies (Sandstone Press Ltd)
Can Xue (Chinese / Chinese), Annelise Finegan Wasmoen, Love In The New Millennium (Yale University Press) – READ
Annie Ernaux (French / French), Alison L. Strayer, The Years (Fitzcarraldo Editions)
Hwang Sok-yong (Korean / Korean), Sora Kim-Russell, At Dusk (Scribe, UK)
Mazen Maarouf (Arabic / Icelandic and Palestinian), Jonathan Wright, Jokes For The Gunmen (Granta, Portobello Books)
Hubert Mingarelli (French / French), Sam Taylor, Four Soldiers (Granta, Portobello Books)
Marion Poschmann (German / German), Jen Calleja, The Pine Islands (Profile Books, Serpent’s Tail)
Samanta Schweblin (Spanish / Argentine and Italian), Megan McDowell, Mouthful Of Birds (Oneworld) – READING
Sara Stridsberg (Swedish / Swedish), Deborah Bragan-Turner, The Faculty Of Dreams (Quercus, MacLehose Press) – READING
Olga Tokarczuk (Polish / Polish), Antonia Lloyd-Jones, Drive Your Plow Over The Bones Of The Dead (Fitzcarraldo Editions)
Juan Gabriel Vásquez (Spanish / Colombian), Anne McLean, The Shape Of The Ruins (Quercus, MacLehose Press)
Tommy Wieringa (Dutch / Dutch), Sam Garrett, The Death Of Murat Idrissi (Scribe, UK)
Alia Trabucco Zeran (Spanish / Chilean and Italian), Sophie Hughes, The Remainder (And Other Stories) – READ

The links send you to my reviews.
The titles in bold are the ones I’m currently reading or haven’t reviewed yet.

I believe that’s from 9 different languages, which is pretty good, BUT none from the Japanese? Wow!

You notice most are fairly short, except The Shape of the Ruins, with 528 pages. That’s a good thing, as the goal is to read many as possible, in just a few weeks.
The shortlist will be announced on April 9, and the winner on May 21.

“Bettany Hughes, chair of the 2019 Man Booker International Prize judging panel, said:
‘This was a year when writers plundered the archive, personal and political. That drive is represented in our longlist, but so too are surreal Chinese train journeys, absurdist approaches to war and suicide, and the traumas of spirit and flesh. We’re thrilled to share 13 books which enrich our idea of what fiction can do.’”

I was able to request 6 from my library (in bold characters), and I just bought #4.
It’s now on my kindle, so goodbye for tonight, I have lots to read.
I’ll start by these 7 titles, and we’ll see from there.
But it seems #9 hasn’t been published in the US yet!

Needless to say that my other reading plans for March are put on hold – except daily chapters of Don Quixote and Les Misérables!

HAVE YOU READ ANY OF THESE?

31 thoughts on “Man Booker International Prize 2019 Longlist”

Gosh you are on the ball with this! I haven’t read a single one of these books yet unfortunately

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WordsAndPeace on March 16, 2019 at 11:45 am said:

I hadn’t read any either before the longlist was published. It was both a very bad and good things my modem crashed on Wed: as all my work is online (teaching French and translating for a news agency), I had nothing to do but read all day, until I got a new modem! That helped

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- annelogan17 on March 17, 2019 at 8:40 pm said:
  
  Those days are few and far between for me, but so lovely!
  
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  - WordsAndPeace on March 18, 2019 at 9:54 am said:
    
    yes and no for me, I’m self-employed, so if I can’t work, I’m really losing a full day of work and pay
    
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    - annelogan17 on March 18, 2019 at 12:42 pm said:
      
      Hmm yes, I see what you mean. yes and no for sure!
      
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I wish I didn’t hate Kindle and could load up all the books I wanna read. Must be so nice.

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WordsAndPeace on March 16, 2019 at 11:44 am said:

what do you hate in the kindle/mobi format? you can use the free program Calibre to convert them into epub usually. unless you just meant ebooks in general. Actually, most of the books I will read on paper, books from my library system

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These are all new to me! I hope you enjoy them!

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WordsAndPeace on March 16, 2019 at 11:40 am said:

almost the same for me! I had heard of 3 only

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Wow, what a fascinating bunch of books! Enjoy your reading! 🙂

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WordsAndPeace on March 16, 2019 at 11:39 am said:

I do hope some of the bunch will be enjoyable

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Gah! I have only read The Years. If you had to recommend a couple more for me, which ones would you pick? What is a shadow panel?

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WordsAndPeace on March 16, 2019 at 11:38 am said:

I just finished At Dusk and Four soldiers, nothing stunning. I’m currently reading The Shape of the Runs and The Pine Islands, which sound better so far. The Shadow Panel is a group of 11 (this year) readers, like unofficial judges. So we do our own judging and will decide on our own short list and winner. Sometimes, the choice corresponds to the official winner, sometimes not. It all started years ago, because we thought the winner should not have been the one officially chosen. See https://tonysreadinglist.wordpress.com/2019/03/03/introducing-the-2019-mbip-shadow-panel/
So, what did you think of The Years?

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Pingback: Book review: At Dusk | Words And Peace

Thank you. I found The Years to be quite great. Since I am also writing my “years” I studied how she managed to compress and concentrate all that life and those years and those changes. Mine, in rough draft, is so wordy!

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