Sri Lankan author Shehan Karunatilaka wins coveted Booker Prize

Shehan Karunatilaka, who was named as the winner of the Booker prize  with his novel The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, is the second Sri Lankan writer to win the prize for novels written in English.

Britain's Queen Camilla presents winner Shehan Karunatilaka with trophee for "The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida" at the Booker Prize 2022 awards ceremony, in London on 17 October, 2022. © Reuters/Toby Melville

"My hope for Seven Moons is this... that in the not-so-distant future... that it is read in a Sri Lanka that has understood that these ideas of corruption and race-baiting and cronyism have not worked and will never work," Shehan Karunatilaka said.

"I hope it's in print in 10 years but if it is, I hope it's written in (a) Sri Lanka that learns from its stories, and that Seven Moons will be in the fantasy section of the bookshop... next to the dragons, the unicorns (and) will not be mistaken for realism or political satire," he added.

Following Michael Ondaatje

Karunatilaka, 47, is the second Sri Lankan to win the award, following Michael Ondaatje's victory in 1992 for The English Patient.

Aside from the £50,000 (57,300 euros) prize, winning the Booker Prize can provide a career-changing boost in sales and public profile.

Chair of judges, Neil MacGregor, called the book "an afterlife noir that dissolves the boundaries not just of different genres, but of life and death, body and spirit, east and west".

The book is set amid the mayhem of a civil-war wracked Colombo in the late 1980s.

War photographer and gambler Maali Almeida has been killed, and sets out in the afterlife to work out who was responsible and expose the brutality of the conflict, having seven moons in which to do so.

Everything you need to know about the winning book: what it's about, why it won, how the author wrote it and what the judges and critics said 📚🏆

Read here: https://t.co/SA1FqqRAt9 pic.twitter.com/aLNOGFHLPm

— The Booker Prizes (@TheBookerPrizes) October 18, 2022

Queen Consort Camilla awarded the coveted prize at the televised ceremony, in one of her highest-profile appearances since her husband King Charles III ascended the throne last month.

The Booker is Britain's foremost literary award for novels written in English. Its previous recipients include Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood and Hilary Mantel.

(with AFP)