Judges picked Barakat from a six-strong shortlist featuring a record four female authors. She was announced as the winner at a packed ceremony in Abu Dhabi...on Tuesday night (23rd April).
In addition to winning $50,000, funding will be provided for the English translation of The Night Mail. An English edition has already been secured by Oneworld, scheduled to appear in 2020, and Barakat said the book, with its themes of migration, would be "very interesting" to readers in the current UK climate.
Her novel tells the stories of its characters through letters written to their relatives in Lebanon, interconnecting and overlapping during the course of the work. They left not only because of war but their home’s painful past and uncertain future. Its theme is described as “one of deep questioning and ambiguity, where boundaries have been erased, and old places and homes lost forever”.
In her speech, Barakat, who left Lebanon during its civil war and now lives in France, revealed she nearly did not enter the prize this year after only being longlisted in 2013 for her novel The Kingdom of This Earth (Dar al-Adab). However, she said Booker Prize Foundation chairman Jonathan Taylor helped convince her to enter again. She said: "The Arabic language is more important to me than any prize."
Speaking afterwards, she explained: "I don't seek exposure, I don't seek popularity."
"I don't care about statistics and numbers," she went on. "If I sell 15 books it's fine, if I sell 50 books then that's better."
She also praised the other shortlisted novels, saying: "This is proof that Arabic fiction is growing in position and stature to an equal level with other novels." "
Read more from source at The Bookseller here.
