27 May 2011
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Santiago Roncagliolo wins The Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2011
Peruvian Santiago Roncagliolo has won this year's Independent Foreign Fiction Prize for his novel Red April ...
Peruvian author Santiago Roncagliolo has become the youngest-ever winner of The Independent Foreign Fiction Prize with his novel Red April
It is the first time the award has been won by a Peruvian writer. The £10,000 prize money will be shared with Red April's American translator, Edith Grossman.
Commenting on his win, 36-year-old Santiago paid tribute to British writers who had inspired him. 'Red April is a book with a lot of British influences, from Ian McEwan's The Innocent to Allan Moore's graphic novel From Hell. Maybe that is why British readers have been so generous to me.'
Boyd Tonkin, literary editor of The Independent, said: 'Santiago Roncagliolo has won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize with a novel that will grip, excite, disturb and challenge all its readers. Rooted in but not confined to the cycle of terror and counter-terror in Peru, Red April deploys with tremendous skill and cunning the arts of the political thriller in order to dramatise the struggle between love and hate, creation and destruction, in a community, a country – and in the human mind itself.'
It is the first time the award has been won by a Peruvian writer. The £10,000 prize money will be shared with Red April's American translator, Edith Grossman.
Commenting on his win, 36-year-old Santiago paid tribute to British writers who had inspired him. 'Red April is a book with a lot of British influences, from Ian McEwan's The Innocent to Allan Moore's graphic novel From Hell. Maybe that is why British readers have been so generous to me.'
Boyd Tonkin, literary editor of The Independent, said: 'Santiago Roncagliolo has won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize with a novel that will grip, excite, disturb and challenge all its readers. Rooted in but not confined to the cycle of terror and counter-terror in Peru, Red April deploys with tremendous skill and cunning the arts of the political thriller in order to dramatise the struggle between love and hate, creation and destruction, in a community, a country – and in the human mind itself.'
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