The e-mail I got on Wednesday said that the information was "embargoed until Saturday 8 March" -- without asking me beforehand whether or not I agreed to those terms; as it turns out, even one of the prize's judges and sponsors couldn't be bothered to hold out, as Boyd Tonkin already offers his overview in The Independent, Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2014: Our long-list reveals a fictional eco-system of staggering diversity.
[Good luck enforcing that embargo next year, if they again send the information out early to bloggers, literary editors, etc.; all credibility has gone by the wayside.]
The fifteen-title strong longlist was selected from 126 entries translated from 30 different languages. (By comparison: the Best Translated Book Award -- whose longlist will be announced next Tuesday -- considered about three times as many titles (indeed, entrants from just the top three countries -- France (54), Germany (40), and Italy (27) -- come close to the IFFP total ...), written in thirty-nine languages.)
The IFFP longlisted titles are:
It's certainly a solid and nicely varied list -- no more than two titles in any language, but two in both Icelandic and Arabic, as well as some Far Eastern representation (including the attention-deserving Revenge). Still, I have to say from my biased position as Best Translated Book Award judge -- and noting that the two prizes and longlists aren't entirely comparable (for one, the BTBA longlists a ridiculous (awesome !) twenty-five titles -- the BTBA longlist looks to be shaping up considerably more heavy-weight and more impressive (adding that I think this is probably the strongest longlist (and pool from which we selected) in my time as BTBA judge; as noted, the IFFP longlist is drawn from a somewhat different pool of books).
The IFFP shortlist -- the final six -- is "due to be announced at the London Book Fair on 8 April" (so look for Tonkin to leak it a few days before that ...).
See also commentary on the longlist at The Mookse and the Gripes.
The fifteen-title strong longlist was selected from 126 entries translated from 30 different languages. (By comparison: the Best Translated Book Award -- whose longlist will be announced next Tuesday -- considered about three times as many titles (indeed, entrants from just the top three countries -- France (54), Germany (40), and Italy (27) -- come close to the IFFP total ...), written in thirty-nine languages.)
The IFFP longlisted titles are:
- Back to Back by Julia Franck
- Brief Loves that Live Forever by Andreï Makine
- Butterflies in November by Audur Ava Ólafsdóttir
- The Corpse Washer by Sinan Antoon
- The Dark Road by Ma Jian
- Exposure by Sayed Kashua
- The Infatuations by Javier Marías
- The Iraqi Christ by Hassan Blasim
- A Man in Love by Karl Ove Knausgaard
- A Meal in Winter by Hubert Mingarelli
- The Mussel Feast by Birgit Vanderbeke
- Revenge by Ogawa Yoko
- The Sorrow of Angels by Jón Kalman Stefánsson
- Strange Weather in Tokyo by Kawakami Hiromi
- Ten by Andrej Longo
It's certainly a solid and nicely varied list -- no more than two titles in any language, but two in both Icelandic and Arabic, as well as some Far Eastern representation (including the attention-deserving Revenge). Still, I have to say from my biased position as Best Translated Book Award judge -- and noting that the two prizes and longlists aren't entirely comparable (for one, the BTBA longlists a ridiculous (awesome !) twenty-five titles -- the BTBA longlist looks to be shaping up considerably more heavy-weight and more impressive (adding that I think this is probably the strongest longlist (and pool from which we selected) in my time as BTBA judge; as noted, the IFFP longlist is drawn from a somewhat different pool of books).
The IFFP shortlist -- the final six -- is "due to be announced at the London Book Fair on 8 April" (so look for Tonkin to leak it a few days before that ...).
See also commentary on the longlist at The Mookse and the Gripes.