The other prize-winners were the Austrian Paulus Hochgatterer, Emmanuelle Pagano from France, the Irish writer Karen Gillece, the Italian Daniele Del Giudice, the Lithuanian Sintija Cerniauskaite, the Polish writer Jacek Dukaj, Dulce Maria Cardoso from Portugal, the Slovakian Pavol Rankov, the Swede Helena Henschen, the Croatian Mila Pavicevic and the Norwegian Carl Frode Tiller.
The ceremony was attended by the Commission President José Manuel Barroso, Commissioner Figel, the Swedish Minister for Culture Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth, the prize-winning authors themselves, Henning Mankell -- the patron of this years' prize - and about 800 people active in Europe's cultural life.
The European Union Prize for Literature will be granted in three phases, in the years 2009, 2010 and 2011, with 11 or 12 winners each time. In this way, literature in all the 34 countries participating in the Culture Programme will be covered by the prize over a period of three years. The award spotlights emerging talent and aims at stimulating the circulation of their books across Europe and contributes to changing attitudes to awareness and openness to literature from abroad.
Szécsi Noémi
, born in1976, is a writer and translator. She graduated in Finnish and English in Budapest, and studied cultural anthropology in Helsinki. She published her first novel, Finno-Ugrian Vampire in 2002, reprinted in 2003 due to its success. The script based on the novel was shortlisted by the workshop of Sundance Institute.
Szécsi's most recent novel, The Last Centaur, about anarchist bicycle messengers, was published in Hungary in June.
Source: Hungarian News Agency (MTI) / Photo: metrom.hu
