Philip Roth won the £60,000 (US$97,134) Man Booker International Prize,
which is presented once every two years to a living author for a body
of work published either originally in English or widely available in
translation in the English language. Previous winners were Ismail
Kadaré, Chinua Achebe and Alice Munro. Roth will be honored at a formal
dinner in London June 28. "For more than 50 years Philip Roth's books have stimulated, provoked and amused an enormous, and still expanding, audience," said Rick Gekoski, chair of the judging panel. "His imagination has not only recast our idea of Jewish identity, it has also reanimated fiction, and not just American fiction, generally. His career is remarkable in that he starts at such a high level, and keeps getting better. In his 50s and 60s, when most novelists are in decline, he wrote a string of novels of the highest, enduring quality. Indeed, his most recent, Nemesis (2010), is as fresh, memorable, and alive with feeling as anything he has written. His is an astonishing achievement."
In thanking the judges, Roth observed: "One of the particular pleasures I've had as a writer is to have my work read internationally despite all the heartaches of translation that that entails. I hope the prize will bring me to the attention of readers around the world who are not familiar with my work. This is a great honor and I'm delighted to receive it." You can watch his acceptance message here.