George McWhirter, left, and Scott Griffin, founder of the Griffin Poetry Prize, pose in this Wednesday, June 5, 2024 handout photo. Self-Portrait in the Zone of Silence, written in Spanish by Homero Aridjis and translated into English by Irish-Canadian writer George McWhirter, won the Griffin Poetry Prize.
The $130,000 prize is the world's largest prize for a single book of poetry written in or translated into English. Because the winning book is a translation from Spanish, the Griffin Poetry Prize will allocate 60 per cent of the prize to the translator and 40 per cent to the original poet.is a poetry collection that reflects on the past and looks to the future.
McWhirter has been translating Aridjis's poetry since 1987. "What I particularly like is it he writes about real things," he toldin a interview after he won. "It does move into the 'other,' as they used to call it, 'el otro,' the other side of things, but he's always writing about things that happen, people that do things.
The 2024 jury was comprised of Canadian poet A.F. Moritz, German poet Jan Wagner and American poet Anne Waldman. They read 592 books, submitted by 235 publishers from 14 different countries.brings poet-translator George McWhirter's adept English to the service of a great world-poet, Homero Aridjis," said the jury in a press statement.
St. John's-based writer Don McKay was awarded the $25,000 lifetime achievement award. He's won multiple Governor General awards, the Griffin Poetry Prize and was named to the Order of Canada in 2009. His poetry books includeThe Newfoundland-based writer Don McKay has been publishing poems about the natural world since the ‘80s. This year, he was honoured with the Lifetime Recognition Award from the Griffin Poetry Prize.
2023 marked the first time the Griffin Poetry Prize gave out a single award. The prize previously awarded $65,000 to two works of English-language poetry from the previous year — one Canadian and one international.Sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send you book recommendations, CanLit news, the best author interviews on CBC and more.
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