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Nathan Englander wins the 2012 Frank O’Connor short story award
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Nathan Englander–guest editor of the current issue of Recommended Reading, and contributor to Electric Literature #6 (“The Reader”)–has been awarded the 2012 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award for his collection, What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank.
Englander had some stiff competition for the €25,000 prize, including Etgar Keret, Sarah Hall and Kevin Barry. The judges were taken with “Englander’s powerful, resonant, collection of credible stories,” which they described as “multi-layered in meaning and written in an austere, contemporary idiom applied to ancient ethnic themes.”
We were particularly taken with this anecdote posted to Etgar Keret’s facebook page this morning: “When I told my six-year-old son about the O’Connor Award’s shortlist a few days ago, he said: ‘I hope you or uncle Nathan win.’ And this morning uncle Nathan won! Can’t think of a more deserving writer or person to win this prestigious award.”
What a mensch! Mazal tovs all around.
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— Elissa Goldstein was born and raised in Melbourne. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Brooklyn College and is the Online Editor of Electric Literature. You can find her here.
