Shortlist for the 2005 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award

The shortlist for the 2005 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award was announced today by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Patron of the Award, Councillor Michael Conaghan.

The shortlist titles are:

• Gardening at Night by Diane Awerbuck
• The Half Brother by Lars Saabye Christensen translated from the Norwegian by Kenneth Steven
• The Good Doctor by Damon Galgut
• Elle by Douglas Glover
• Phantom Pain by Arnon Grunberg translated from the Dutch by Sam Garrett
• The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
• Willenbrock by Christoph Hein translated from the German by Philip Boehm
• Deafening by Frances Itani
• The Known World by Edward P. Jones
• The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem

Frances Itani, talking from Hurst, Ontario, was on CBC Radio this afternoon with Brent Bambury expressing her happiness about being on the shortlist. She also had doubly-happy news in that the film rights have been recently sold so that a movie may be made from her first novel, Deafening (2003).

I am also pleased for the talented Damon Galgut, whom I met briefly at the Ottawa International Writers Festival (OIWF) last fall, and for fellow Canadian nominee, Douglas Glover for Elle. The winner will be announced this June 15, 2005. Though the shortlist is impressive and varied, I still think that the omission of Gordon Sheppard's HA! A Self-Murder Mystery is, well, a mystery.