Award for Amos Oz

 

Israel’s best-known writer is awarded the Internationaler Literaturpreis 2015.

 

“Judas” is the name of the novel for which Amos Oz and his translator Mirjam Pressler have been awarded the Internationaler Literaturpreis 2015. The prize, endowed with 25,000 euros, was initiated in 2009 by Berlin’s Haus der Kulturen der Welt and Stiftung Elementarteilchen. It honours an outstanding work of international contemporary literature translated into German for the first time. Oz and Pressler took receipt of the award on 8 July at Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin.

 

Born in Jerusalem in 1939, Oz is the best-known writer in his country. His works have been translated into more than three dozen languages and have won numerous awards. Translator and writer Mirjam Pressler has likewise received many distinctions, including the Buber Rosenzweig Medal, the Carl Zuckmayer Medal for Merits in the German Language, and in spring 2015 the Leipzig Book Fair Prize in the Translation category.

The jury of the Internationaler Literaturpreis 2015 explained its decision as follows: “In his novel, Amos Oz is masterfully able to convey the big issues and conflicts of religious and contemporary history in the Middle East. He interlaces ancient times with the present, contrasting the conflict between Judaism and Christianity with modern Jewish-Palestinian reality. (…) In her German translation, Mirjam Pressler is able to convey a fine nuance of the atmosphere that permeates and carries this intelligent and multi-layered work.”