“A novel against indifference” – German Book Prize for Shida Bazyar
The German Book Prize has been awarded at the start of the Frankfurt Book Fair. Shida Bazyar received the award for her novel Die Lücken.
Frankfurt am Main (dpa) – This year’s German Book Prize has been awarded to author Shida Bazyar for Die Lücken. Through the lives of its individual characters, the novel reflected almost a century of ambivalent German life, the jury said in its citation. The author employed compelling literary strategies, it noted, and: it was a “novel against indifference”.
Born in Rhineland-Palatinate in 1988, Bazyar set Die Lücken in a fictional town called Heimesbach in the Hunsrück region, modelled on her birthplace. Her novel tells the stories of Jewish families, people who profited under the Nazis, and Kurdish and Iranian people seeking protection and refuge in Germany. It brings suppressed chapters of Germany’s past into the open. Roughly 500 pages in length, the novel thus revolves around lies, racism and repression. When the prize shortlist was announced, the jury described it as a novel that draws on a transnational perspective to explore the boundaries of the Heimatroman and redefine the genre.
The German Book Prize is considered one of the industry’s most important awards and is traditionally presented on the day before the Frankfurt Book Fair opens.
