The inaugural Singapore Prize, a new book award honouring non-fiction works with significant Singapore themes and history, is open for submissions until 31 October 2022. Winners will be announced in early 2024, with an awards ceremony to follow later that year. This prize was established in the name of the late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, who envisioned and helped build what is today’s green garden city.
Among the shortlisted titles are a memoir, a history of Singapore’s cultural landscape, and an account of life in Kampong Glam in the 20th century. Other books include a biography of eminent lawyer and human rights campaigner George Goh and a historical study of the tin mining industry that left a lasting mark on Singapore.
In addition to the top prize, a Readers’ Favourite award was introduced for the first time this year to celebrate the popular choices of book fans. Almost 3,000 people voted, with each voter getting a chance to win $50 worth of Book Vouchers from Storytel.
Khir Johari’s The Food of Singapore Malays: Gastronomic Travels Through the Archipelago won the English fiction category, while a tome by historian Wang Gungwu won Chinese fiction. Literary pioneer Marylyn Tan won the English poetry prize, while a work on Singaporean animal history by Timothy P Barnard won the non-fiction category. Other shortlisted authors include Wesley Leon Aroozoo, whose 3.2kg volume took 14 years to complete, and Wong Koi Tet’s collection of short stories.
This year’s judges include Esplanade communications and content head Clarissa Oon, who was a judge in the English creative non-fiction category; Cultural Medallion recipient KTM Iqbal, who was on the panel for Malay poetry; and Dr Sa’eda Buang, who won a prize last year for her book on the Indonesian language and culture. The prize also has a dedicated judging panel for the Chinese and Tamil categories, which included prominent historians.
An Indian maker of solar-powered dryers, a carbon marketplace and groups that restore Andean forests and deter illegal fishing are among the 15 winners of this year’s Earthshot Prize. Launched by Britain’s Prince William, the 10-year-long program honours individuals and organisations bringing solutions to major global challenges.
For the first time, this year’s SLP offered 12 top prizes of up to $10,000 each in Chinese, English, Malay and Tamil. This was done to encourage multilingual publishing in Singapore and to encourage a wider range of readers to explore literature written in their own languages. The organisers said that the prize money “reflects the dynamism of our multi-lingual, multicultural society”.