JNU congratulates alumna Geetanjali Shree on Booker win

NEW DELHI: Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on Saturday congratulated its alumna Geetanjali Shree, whose Hindi novel has become the first book in an Indian language to win the prestigious International Booker Prize. The New Delhi-based author won the prestigious award for 'Tomb of Sand', originally titled 'Ret Samadhi'.

Set in north India, the story follows an 80-year-old woman in a tale the Booker judges dubbed a "joyous cacophony" and an "irresistible novel". "Many Congratulations to JNU alumna, Geetanjali Shree to be the first Hindi author to win International Booker Prize 2022. 'Everything Tells A Story'..." JNU tweeted.

At a ceremony in London on Thursday, the writer said she was "completely overwhelmed" with the "bolt from the blue" as she accepted her prize, worth GBP 50,000, which was equally shared with the book's English translator Daisy Rockwell. Originally published in Hindi in 2018, 'Tomb of Sand' is the first of her books to be published in the UK in English by Tilted Axis Press in August 2021.

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Shree's novel was chosen from a shortlist of six books, the others being: 'Cursed Bunny' by Bora Chung, translated by Anton Hur from Korean; 'A New Name: Septology VI-VII' by Jon Fosse, translated by Damion Searls from Norwegian; 'Heaven' by Mieko Kawakami, translated by Samuel Bett and David Boyd from Japanese; 'Elena Knows' by Claudia Piñeiro, translated by Frances Riddle from Spanish; and 'The Books of Jacob' by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Jennifer Croft from Polish.

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This year, the judges considered 135 books and for the first time in 2022, all shortlisted authors and translators will each receive GBP 2,500, an increase from GBP 1,000 in the previous years – bringing the total value of the prize to GBP 80,000.