The Jan Michalski Prize for Literature is awarded annually for an outstanding work of world literature.
The Jan Michalski Prize for Literature has been awarded annually since 2010 by the Foundation to crown a work of world literature. An original feature of the Prize is its multicultural nature: it rewards works of all literary genres, fiction or non-fiction, irrespective of the language in which it is written.
The rotating jury, which is renewed every three years, is made up of writers recognized for their linguistic skills and their openness to literary diversity. An artist with an interest in literature is also given a seat.
Only members of the jury are entitled to submit works for the Jan Michalski Prize, two per year, chosen from their recent international readings. Neither authors nor publishers may submit titles for selection.
The laureate is honored with a prize of CHF 50,000, which allows him/her to devote more time to his/her writing. He or she also receives a work of art specially chosen for him or her.
Edition 2024
The 2024 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature has been awarded to the Canadian comics artist and author Kate Beaton for her graphic memoir Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands (Drawn & Quarterly, 2022).
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands
Proposed by Jonathan Coe
The jury hails Ducks as “a piercing and daring graphic memoir that sheds light on the hidden side of working conditions in the oil industry through the eyes of a young woman and recent graduate who is thrown into a toxic world because of economic hardship. Featuring clean lines and dialogue imbued with great narrative force, this visual autobiography is able to embrace the most sensitive and painful questions of our time – hypercapitalism, the environment, impoverishment, sexism and sexual harassment – without such a traumatic experience stifling her deep empathy for others in similar circumstances. A profoundly moving masterpiece thanks to the courage it embodies.”
The winner of the 2024 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature, the autobiographical graphic work Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands exists at the point where memoir meets reportage. The book chronicles the two years the author spent in the oil sands work camps among petroleum industry laborers in Western Canada. Unable to find employment in her field that offers a decent wage, heavily in debt and facing the need to pay back her student loans, the twenty-one-year-old Kate Beaton leaves her native Nova Scotia to work in the Alberta oil sands, thousands of miles from her home.
In an industrial world that employs fifty times more men than women, living and working conditions are as toxic as the environment. Spartan camp quarters, social isolation, exhausting schedules, problems with mental health and drug addiction, a hostile work environment, pollution, and the pervasive cynicism that seems built into the system place a terrible strain on human, class and gender relations. Sexism is especially rife in the daily lives of the few minority women workers, who face harassment everywhere, which can tragically lead to sexual violence.
Mining her memories some fifteen years later in a spare line that conjures up a black-and-white atmosphere, Beaton confronts the traumas experienced and seen firsthand over the course of those eight seasons in the soul-testing world of oil sands, yet never does she stray from her deep compassion for the men and women workers who inhabit it. From intimate panels featuring dialogue to large landscape compositions, she brings to visual life this closed world that is out of sight, out of mind, and out of the collective conscience, one that reveals multiple wounds, both personal and of entire groups, inflicted not only on the employees but on the earth itself and nearby indigenous communities. Beaton’s singular view never judges or condemns. She attests to the material realities of an unbridled capitalism that exploits, alienates, commodifies, and dehumanizes. The author doesn’t look to stir up or brow beat; it is her power as simply a witness, playing out between the lines of the story she has to tell, that gradually opens readers’ eyes.
Beaton overwhelms us through her clarity and her ability to see the dysfunctional social dynamics mobilizing fear and poverty as engines of an exploitation that is embraced by the exploited, an illusion at the heart of this world. At the same time, she makes the ongoing ecological disaster the background of her graphic memoir. Through its rejection of both the culture of silence and a Manichean outlook, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands deals a major blow to the suffocating omertà of the oil industry, echoing the most acute contradictions and crises of our time.
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As the winner of the 2024 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature, Kate Beaton will receive CHF 50,000 as well as a work of art by the draftsman Micaël.
Biography
Kate Beaton was born in 1983 in Mabou, a village on Cape Breton Island, Canada. She is a graduate of Mount Allison University with a BA in history and anthropology. While employed in the oil sands of Western Canada following her studies, she worked on her drawing and began posting her material online in 2007. Her short black-and-white strips, treating historical subjects and well-known figures with biting humor, enjoyed growing success and now appear regularly in The New Yorker, Harper, and National Post. In 2011, Drawn & Quarterly published a collection of comics from her Hark! A Vagrant blog, followed by a second in 2015 titled Step Aside, Pops. These series alone earned her a number of prizes, including several Harvey Awards, an Eisner Award, and four Doug Wright. In 2022 she brought out her first book-length work, a graphic memoir titled Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands (Drawn & Quarterly), which has won the 2024 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature.
Attaquer la terre et le soleil
Proposed by Vera Michalski-Hoffmann
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands
Proposed by Jonathan Coe
When I Sing, Mountains Dance
Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, 2022
Proposed by Kapka Kassabova
Attaquer la terre et le soleil
Proposed by Vera Michalski-Hoffmann
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands
Proposed by Jonathan Coe
When I Sing, Mountains Dance
Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, 2022
Proposed by Kapka Kassabova
Traces of Enayat
And Other Stories, Sheffield, 2023
Proposed by Kapka Kassabova
Une autobiographie de Nina Childress
Proposed by Valérie Mréjen
Attaquer la terre et le soleil
Proposed by Vera Michalski-Hoffmann
Austral
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 2023
Proposed by Sjón
Avec les fées
Proposed by Andrea Marcolongo
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands
Proposed by Jonathan Coe
Infocracy: Digitization and the Crisis of Democracy
Polity, Cambridge, 2022
Proposed by Gonçalo M. Tavares
James Brown mettait des bigoudis
Proposed by Andrea Marcolongo
When I Sing, Mountains Dance
Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, 2022
Proposed by Kapka Kassabova
Wandering Souls
Proposed by Jonathan Coe
My Friends
Proposed by Vera Michalski-Hoffmann
Paradais
New Directions, New York, 2022
Proposed by Gonçalo M. Tavares
Sans valeur
Proposed by Valérie Mréjen
Traces of Enayat
And Other Stories, Sheffield, 2023
Proposed by Kapka Kassabova
The Future Future
Proposed by Sjón
Une autobiographie de Nina Childress
Proposed by Valérie Mréjen
Jury
Vera Michalski-Hoffmann, President of the jury
The publisher Vera Michalski-Hoffmann, born in 1954, who has always been committed to promoting literature and the written word, founded the publishing group Libella with Jan Michalski. Since 1987 numerous authors have been brought out in French, Polish and English at various publishing houses, including Noir sur Blanc, Buchet-Chastel, Phébus, Wydawnictwo Literackie, and World Editions. In 2004 Vera Michalski created the Jan Michalski Foundation for Writing and Literature, whose mission is to foster literary creation and encourage the practice of reading through a range of initiatives and activities.
Jonathan Coe
The British novelist and biographer Jonathan Coe was born in 1961 in Birmingham (UK). He studied at the King Edward’s School and Trinity College, before going on to earn a PhD in English literature. He teaches at the University of Warwick. Coe made a name for himself internationally with his fourth novel, What a Carve Up! (Viking Press, 1994). The French translation, published the following year (Testament à l’anglaise, Gallimard, 1995), was awarded the Prix du Meilleur Livre étranger in 1996. His body of work has earned Coe a number of awards in his native Britain; published by Gallimard, his books have also garnered several prestigious prizes in France, including the 1998 Prix Médicis étranger for La maison du sommeil (The House of Sleep), and the 2019 European Book Prize for Le cœur de l’Angleterre (Middle England). In 2004 he became a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de France.
Kapka Kassabova
Born in 1973 in Sofia, Bulgaria, Kapka Kassabova is the author of several collections of poetry, novels, and narrative nonfiction books in both Bulgarian and English. In 1992 her family emigrated to New Zealand, where she studied French, Russian and English literature and published her first texts. In 2005 she settled in Scotland. Her first two books to be brought out in French by Marchialy, Lisière (2020; originally published as Border in 2017) and L’écho du lac (2021; originally published as To the Lake in 2020), have won several awards, including Prix Nicolas Bouvier, special mention for the Prix du livre européen, and the Prix du Meilleur Livre étranger for nonfiction. Her work has been translated into some twenty languages. Her last book in English, Elixir: In the Valley at the End of Time has been brought out by Jonathan Cape/Graywolf in 2023.
Andrea Marcolongo
The Italian writer and journalist Andrea Marcolongo was born in 1987 in Crema, Italy. A scholar of ancient Greek with a degree in Classical Literature from the Università degli Studi in Milan, she has written several best-selling books, including La lingua geniale. 9 buone ragioni per amare il greco in 2016 (The Ingenious Language: Nine Epic Reasons to Love Greek, 2019); La misura eroica. Il mito degli argonauti e il coraggio che spinge gli uomini ad amare in 2018; Alla fonte delle parole. 99 etimologie che ci parlano di noi in 2019; and La Lezione di Enea in 2020 (Starting from Scratch: The Life-Changing Lessons of Aeneas, 2022). Her books have been translated in nearly thirty countries. She is also a member of the jury for the Prix du Grand Continent and is a regular contributor to Italian and foreign newspapers, including La Stampa and Le Figaro.
Valérie Mréjen
Born in 1969 in Paris, Valérie Mréjen is a French novelist, visual artist, and director of films and videos. A graduate of the École nationale supérieure d’arts of Cergy-Pontoise in 1994, she began by publishing artist’s books before entering the field of audiovisual production. She has made a number of short films and documentaries, including Pork and Milk (2004) and Valvert (2008), as well as the feature-length drama En ville (distributed internationally as Iris in Bloom) with Bertrand Schefer in 2011, which was shortlisted the same year for the Quinzaine des réalisateurs at Cannes. She published Mon grand-père (1999), L’agrume (2001), and Eau sauvage (2004) at Éditions Allia, and Forêt noire (2012), Troisième personne (2017) and La jeune artiste (2023) at Éditions P.O.L. Her artwork has been shown in France and abroad, notably at the Jeu de Paume, which devoted a solo show to her in 2008.
Gonçalo M. Tavares
Gonçalo M. Tavares was born in Luanda, Angola, in 1970. A prize-winning Portuguese writer and professor of epistemology at the University of Lisbon, he is seen today as one of the main literary voices in that language and has published in a variety of genres, from novels and poetry, to plays and essays. His works have been translated into over fifty languages and have won a number of national and international awards, including the José Saramago Prize for Jerusalem in 2005, and France’s prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger for Learning to Pray in the Age of Technology in 2010. In 2019 was published in English Reading Is Walking.
Sjón
Sjón (Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson) was born in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 1962. He is a celebrated Icelandic novelist, poet, lyricist and screenwriter. His novels include The Blue Fox (2005 Nordic Council’s Literature Prize), From the Mouth of the Whale, The Whispering Muse, the trilogy CoDex 1962 and Red Milk (2019), and have been translated into thirty-five languages. His long-time collaboration with the singer Björk led to an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song, “I’ve Seen It All” from Lars von Trier’s Dancer in the Dark. The most recent film he co-wrote is Robert Eggers’ feature The Northman (2022), inspired by the Icelandic sagas. He is the president of the Icelandic PEN Center.
Related
Laudatio for Kate Beaton
by Jonathan Coe, member of the Jury
Speech by Kate Beaton, laureate
Previous editions
2023
El Tercer País
2022
Les fossoyeuses
2021
Знак не сотрется. Судьбы остарбайтеров в письмах, воспоминаниях и устных рассказах
2020
Sands of the Emperor
2019
Pain
2018
Ksiegi Jakubowe
2017
Une histoire mondiale du communisme
2016
The Physics of Sorrow
2015
Birth Certificate: The Story of Danilo Kiš
2014
Vorochylovhrad
2013
The Colonel
2012
The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams and the Making of China
2011
The White King
2010
The Lazarus Project
Rules
In accordance with article two of the statutes of the Jan Michalski Foundation for Literature and the Written Word (hereafter the Jan Michalski Foundation), the Foundation Board decided to create a literary prize called the Jan Michalski Prize for Literature (hereafter the Jan Michalski Prize).
The Jan Michalski Prize was officially established on 27 October 2009.
Article 1 — The Jan Michalski Prize
The Jan Michalski Prize will be awarded to a work of world literature in the categories of fiction, nonfiction, or illustrated books.
Article 1.1 — Criteria for awarding the Jan Michalski Prize
The Jan Michalski Prize is awarded to one book annually. The prize is not limited to any one language in particular.
Article 1.2 — Frequency of the prize
The Jan Michalski Prize is awarded once a year.
Article 1.3 — What winners of the Jan Michalski Prize receive
The winner of the prize receives CHF 50,000 (fifty thousand Swiss francs), a diploma, and a work of art especially selected for the Jan Michalski Prize.
Collective works are also eligible for consideration by the Prize Committee; if a book by several authors wins, the Jan Michalski Prize is awarded to all of them and the sum of CHF 50,000 is divided among the various winners.
Article 1.4 — When the prize is awarded
The Jan Michalski Prize is normally awarded each year in November during a ceremony in Montricher.
Article 2 — The Prize Committee
Article 2.1 — Committee members
The Jan Michalski Prize is awarded by the Jan Michalski Foundation for Literature and the Written Word. The prize winner is selected by an international committee of writers. One seat on the committee is reserved for an artist who has also shown a sincere interest in literature. Vera Michalski, who chairs the Foundation Board, is the lifetime Chairwoman of the Prize Committee.
Article 2.2 — Selection of the committee members
The Chairwoman of the Prize Committee appoints the other members of the committee. Membership on the committee is strictly honorary, that is, no payment attaches to the post. Members serve for three years. The Foundation Board, however, does reserve the right to reduce the term of individual committee members. At the end of the members’ term, the Foundation Board is free to either reappoint the same members or appoint new ones.
The Prize Committee is made up of well-known figures from a range of nationalities and cultural backgrounds who are at ease in two or more languages and widely recognized in any of the forms of literary and artistic expression.
Members sit on the Prize Committee in their own name and represent no interest group or commercial entity.
The Chairwoman of the Jan Michalski Foundation Board will write to each person appointed to the Prize Committee to confirm their appointment. Before serving, committee members will of course acquaint themselves with the present Rules.
Article 3 — Proposing candidates
Article 3.1 — Terms and conditions for participation
Members of the Prize Committee alone are authorized to propose books for consideration, with a maximum of two proposals per member. The members may only submit books published and printed by publishing houses are admissible. Manuscripts and self-published works are not accepted. The submitted books must have been published within five years prior to attribution of the Jan Michalski Prize. Reeditions are not accepted unless the book in question has been significantly revised by the original author.
Article 3.2 — Closing date
The members of the Prize Committee must submit their choice of two books for the Prize by mid-March each year. The shortlist of books competing for the Jan Michalski Prize is published on the foundation’s website.
Article 4 — Prize committee delibérations
The Members of the Prize Committee deliberate in complete freedom and independence, and, apart from the present rules, receive instructions from no one. Their deliberations are secret and the minutes of their meetings are not published.
Decisions are taken by simple majority but at least three-quarters of the committee members must participate in the vote for the deliberations to be valid.
The Prize Committee meets once initially to draw up a shortlist. At the end of that meeting, the committee decides on a limited number of books for final consideration. If need be, excerpts from proposed books are translated into a language that is accessible to all of the committee’s members.
The winner of the prize is announced during the committee’s concluding session. The committee’s decision is final and not subject to appeal.
Article 5 — Final provisions
Article 5.1 — Amendments to the rules
The rules can be revised at any time by the Foundation Board, except for the provision concerning the lifetime membership of the Chairwoman of the Prize Committee.
Article 5.2 — Announcing the prize winner
The results of the committee’s deliberations will be made public through the usual media. Only authors whose works have been shortlisted will be notified.