The prestigious Canadian literary award is celebrating its 25th year.
By Katrina Caruso
The five jury members for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize were announced last week. A prestigious award for Canadian fiction writers, the Giller was created in 1994 by Toronto businessman Jack Rabinovitch to honour his late wife, Doris Giller, a literary editor. In the quarter century since, the prize and the events surrounding it have helped raise the profile of Canadian literature.
The author whose novel or short story collection is named the year’s best Canadian work of fiction published in English receives $100,000, and the finalists each receive $10,000. The 2017 award winner was Michael Redhill, for his novel Bellevue Square, published by Doubleday Canada.
This year’s Scotiabank Giller Prize jury members are:
Kamal Al-Solaylee, Canadian writer and journalist, author of Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes, and finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award.
Maxine Bailey, co-writer of Sistahs, an award-winning play, and the Toronto International Film Festival’s Vice-President of Advancement.
John Freeman, American writer (author of Maps, a poetry collection) and founder of Freeman’s, a literary biannual.
Philip Hensher, English novelist whose book Kitchen Venom won the Somerset Maugham Award.
Heather O’Neill, Canadian author whose work has won the Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction and been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award for Fiction and for the Giller twice. Her most recent novel is The Lonely Hearts Hotel.
The 2018 longlist will be announced on September 17 in St. John’s, NL, and the shortlist, on October 1 in Toronto. In November, the winner will be announced in Toronto during a gala ceremony to be televised nationally.
For a complete list of past winners, longlists, and jury members, see here.
Photo: iStock/mbtphotos.