Three Monkeys Online

A Curious, Alternative Magazine

No, I was not invited

From the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award site:”The winner was announced by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Councillor Michael Conaghan in City Hall, Dublin on Wednesday 15th June.In their comments on the novel the judges said “The Known World begins with the death, at the age of 31, of Henry Townsend, a black farmer in Manchester County, the largest county in antebellum Virginia. Among the property bequeathed to his widow are 13 women, 11 men and 9 children – for Henry, once a slave, was an owner of slaves himsel…[sic]Edward P. Jones has created a richly imagined novel, in which a multitude of moral contradictions are revealed and explored.The winner will be presented with a specially commissioned piece of Waterford Crystal and the prize money at a presentation dinner on Wednesday 15th.”By the way, that prize, which comes across in the press release as a mere bonus on top of the “specially commissioned piece of Waterford Crystal” is a pretty nifty �100,000–and because the work is in English Jones does not have to share it with a translator. Jones has already won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize with this novel, for which he received the relatively miserly amount of $10,000. However, while most half-serious readers have heard of the Pulitzer, IMPAC continues to hand out buckets of cash in semi-obscurity. But one only has to look at the award’s dull-as-ditchwater website to gather that the administrators lack much in the way of media savvy.