Limerick-based writer awarded Prix Jean Monnet for European Literature
WRITER Donal Ryan has added yet another award to his long list of achievements.
Donal, a Tipperary man who has made Limerick his home, has become the first Irish writer to win Prix Jean Monnet for European Literature for his novel From a Low and Quiet Sea.
The book, Donal’s third novel, was published in 2018 and translated into French this year. It was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize that year.
Donal will receive the award, including a cheque for €5,000 at the European Literature Festival in Cognac, France on November 20.
The writer Gérard de Cortanze, president of the jury for the Jean Monnet Prize, said they wanted to “distinguish a young author considered to be one of the great revelations of Irish literature but also worldwide”.
Donal, he said, had been compared rightly to William Faulkner and John McGahern and shows a “profound humanity towards his peers”.
“He is an emphatic painter of tormented souls,” Mr de Cortanze continued. “We certainly could not miss out on such a masterpiece.”
Donal Ryan’s first published novel, The Spinning Heart, catapulted the author into the world of literature awards, winning the Guardian First Book Award, the EU Prize for Literature and the Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards. It was also shortlisted for the IMPAC International Literary Award and longlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
He has published four novels and a collection of short stories since. Strange Flowers, published last year, won An Post Novel of the Year.
Donal Ryan was born and reared in County Tipperary but lives with his wife and children in Limerick.
He lectures in creative writing at UL.
Donal Ryan will be the guest speaker at the launch of Just One More Thing, a collection of short stories by Pat McLoughlin which takes place in the Longcourt House Hotel, Newcastle West on Friday, October 22.