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Arundhati Roy won the 2024 PEN Pinter Prize, English PEN announced on 27 June 2024. The award recognizes writers of outstanding literary merit whose work confronts the realities of society. English PEN chair Ruth Borthwick praised Roy for telling “urgent stories of injustice with wit and beauty,” adding that “her powerful voice is not to be silenced.”
Why Arundhati Roy received the prize
The PEN Pinter Prize was established in 2009 by English PEN in memory of playwright Harold Pinter. Its annual award is for a writer of outstanding literary merit who lives in the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, or the Commonwealth. Its criteria draw on Pinter’s Nobel Prize speech, which called for an “unflinching, unswerving” gaze on the world and a “fierce intellectual determination … to define the real truth of our lives and our societies.”
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Mother Mary Comes to Me | $15.00 | Buy on Amazon |
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The God of Small Things: A Novel | $11.45 | Buy on Amazon |
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In announcing Roy’s selection, English PEN chair Ruth Borthwick said Roy tells “urgent stories of injustice with wit and beauty.” She noted that India remains an important focus of Roy’s writing, while describing her as “truly an internationalist thinker.” These remarks explain the award’s fit with the prize’s emphasis on literary merit and engagement with social realities.
Who selected Roy, and what did she say?
Roy was chosen in April 2024 by a panel comprising English PEN chair Ruth Borthwick, actor and activist Khalid Abdalla, and writer and musician Roger Robinson. Roy said she was delighted to accept the prize and wished Harold Pinter were alive to write about “the almost incomprehensible turn the world is taking.” She added: “Since he isn’t, some of us must do our utmost to try to fill his shoes.”
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What is the Writer of Courage award?
The PEN Pinter Prize is shared with a Writer of Courage: a writer active in defending freedom of expression, often at great risk to their safety and liberty. Roy was to choose the co-recipient from a shortlist of cases supported by English PEN, with the name due to be announced at the ceremony. The available announcement confirms that selection process but does not establish who received the 2024 Writer of Courage award.
When was the ceremony?
English PEN and the British Library scheduled the 2024 ceremony for 10 October at the British Library, where Roy was also due to deliver an address. The announcement confirms the scheduled date, not the eventual ceremony outcome.
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Roy’s literary background
Roy’s debut novel, The God of Small Things, won the Booker Prize, according to India Today. That novel is part of her wider literary background; it should not be mistaken for the work specifically cited as earning the PEN Pinter Prize, which recognizes a writer’s outstanding literary merit under the award’s broader criteria.
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