2021 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards shortlist

The shortlist for the 2021 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards has been announced. The State Library of NSW has the full list on its website, but you have to do a lot of clicking back back and forth to read it.

Here’s an attempt to make the list accessible in one place, and in the order that the awards are generally announced on the big night. If you click on a title you will be taken to the judges’ comments. I’ve also added links to the very few titles that I’ve read and blogged about. In memory of my youthful enjoyment of betting on roulette, I’ve bolded the titles I’m tipping to win. [Added later: I’ve marked the actual winners with a triple asterisk ***.]

NSW Premier’s Translation Prize

If I remember correctly, in the past this award was given to translators without being tied to a particular book. This year it’s for ‘a translation in book form’.

• Travels with a Writing Brush: Classical Japanese Travel Writing from the Manyoshu to Basho, translated by Meredith McKinney (Penguin Random House)
• Imminence, Marian Dimópoulos, translated by Alice Whitmore (Giramondo) ***
• This Tilting World, Colette Fellous, translated by Sophie Rebecca Lewis (Two Lines Press & Les Fugitives)
• Autumn Manuscripts, Tasos Leivaditis, translated by N. N. Trakakis (Smokestack Books) ***
• Sergius Seeks Bacchus, Norman Erikson Pasaribu, translated by Tiffany Tsao (Giramondo)
• Russia Washed in Blood. A Novel in Fragments, Artyom Vesyoly, translated by Kevin Windle (Anthem Press)

UTS Glenda Adams Award for New Writing

• The Octopus and I, Erin Hortle (Allen & Unwin)
• Cherry Beach, Laura McPhee-Browne (Text) ***
• A Couple of Things Before the End, Sean O’Beirne (Black Inc.)
• Song of the Crocodile, Nardi Simpson (Hachette Australia)
• The Inland Sea, Madelaine Watts (ONE, an imprint of Pushkin Press)

Multicultural NSW Award

• After Australia, edited by Michael Mohammed Ahmad (Affirm Press)
• The F Team, Rawah Arja (Giramondo)
• Metal Fish, Falling Snow, Cath Moore (Text)
• The Coconut Children, Vivian Pham (Penguin Random House Australia)
• A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing, Jessie Tu (Allen & Unwin)
• Throat, Ellen van Neerven (UQP) – my blog post here ***

Betty Roland Prize for Scriptwriting

• Freeman, Laurence Billiet (General Strike and Matchbox Pictures) ***
• Penguin Bloom, Shaun Grant and Harry Cripps (Made Up Stories, Broadtalk and JamTart) – my tiny blog post here
• Stateless, Episode 6: ‘The Seventh Circle’, Elise McCredie (Matchbox Pictures) – my tiny blog post on the series here (I don’t remember individual episodes)

Nick Enright Prize for Playwriting

• Triple X, Glace Chase (Queensland Theatre/ Sydney Theatre Company)
• Lady Tabouli, James Elazzi (National Theatre of Parramatta)
• No Pay? No Way! Marieke Hardy (Sydney Theatre Company)
• The Visitors, Jane Harrison (Moogahlin)
• Packer & Sons, Tommy Murphy (Belvoir) – my tiny blog post here
• Milk, Dylan van den Berg (The Street Theatre) ***

Patricia Wrightson Prize for Children’s Literature

• Action Tank — Book 2, Mike Barry (Mike Barry Was Here)
• Winter of the White Bear, Martin Ed Chatterton (Dirt Lane Press)
• Across the Risen Sea, Bren Macdibble (Allen & Unwin)
• I Heart the World: A Celebration of Land, Sea, Flora, Fauna and People Around the Globe, Tania McCartney (Hardie Grant)
• The Grandest Bookshop in the World, Amelia Mellor (Affirm Press) ***
• Her Perilous Mansion, Sean Williams (Allen & Unwin)

Ethel Turner Prize for Young People’s Literature

• The F Team, Rawah Arja (Giramondo)
• The End of the World is Bigger than Love, Davina Bell (Text) ***
• Ghost Bird, Lisa Fuller (UQP)
• Metal Fish, Falling Snow, Cath Moore (Text)
• Where We Begin, Christie Nieman (Pan Macmillan Australia)
• Loner, Georgina Young (Text)

Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry

• Element: The Atomic Weight & Radius of Love, Jordie Albiston (Puncher & Wattman)
• Ask Me About the Future, Rebecca Jessen (UQP)
• A History of What I’ll Become, Jill Jones (UWA Publishing)
• Change Machine, Jaya Savige (UQP)
• Throat, Ellen van Neerven (UQP) – my blog post here ***

Douglas Stewart Prize for Non-fiction

• Father of the Lost Boys, Yuot Ajang Alaak (Fremantle Press)
• In the Time of the Manaroans, Miro Bilbrough (Victoria University Press)
• Womerah Lane: Lives and Landscapes, Tom Carment (Giramondo)
• The Warrior, the Voyager, and the Artist: Three Lives in an Age of Empire, Kate Fullagar (Yale University Press) ***
• A Question of Colour: My Journey to Belonging, Pattie Lees and Adam C Lees (Magabala)
• The Trials of Portnoy: How Penguin Brought Down Australia’s Censorship System, Patrick Mullins (Scribe)

Christina Stead Prize for Fiction

• A Room Made of Leaves, Kate Grenville (Text) ***
• Murmurations, Carol Lefevre (Spinifex Press)
• Cherry Beach, Laura McPhee-Browne(Text)
• The Dictionary of Lost Words, Pip Williams (Affirm Press)
• The Weekend, Charlotte Wood (Allen & Unwin) – my blog post here
• The Bass Rock, Evie Wyld (Penguin Random House)

Awards that don’t have shortlists

• Residents of New South Wales can vote for any of the titles on the Christina Stead Prize shortlist for the People’s Choice Award (click here to vote)
• The judges get to choose from among the winners of the other categories for the Book of the Year award
• The judges can make a Special Award for a) an Australian literary work that is not readily covered by the existing categories; b) a lifetime achievement award for an Australian writer (this is also known as the Kiss of Death Award, though several people have lived on after receiving it); or c) a significant contribution to the literary life of Australia.

The winners will be announced online on Monday 26 April at 7.30 pm (AEST), and on Tuesday 27 April at 11.30 am at the State Library of NSW and online, the winners will do readings, as part of the Sydney Writers’ Festival.

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