Friday, September 19, 2014

Taumarunui author wins at BNZ Literary Awards


Taumarunui author, Anna Granger has won the Short Short Story category this year with her story, Territories, at the BNZ Literary Awards in Wellington last night.

After making the shortlist last year in the same category, Ms Granger was delighted to take out the win this year.

“I’ve always been very interested in ‘very short’ story writing. I like paring down as far as I can to concentrate and intensify the setting and the characters,” she says.

This was the fourth year that this award category has been run, and almost 1000 entries were received, all via Facebook. 

BNZ chief marketing officer Craig Herbison is proud of the role that the Literary Awards play in promoting New Zealand’s literary talent.
“With most of us spending more time interacting online these days, it’s great to be able to acknowledge this shift, and continue to encourage writing through increasingly relevant mediums,” he says.

Short Short Story category judge, Graham Beattie, believed that the calibre of entries was outstanding considering that the short short story is “the most difficult of all fiction genres in which to write”. 

Established in 1959, the BNZ Literary Awards, formerly the Katherine Mansfield Awards, aim to foster and grow literature in New Zealand and are the country’s longest-running short story awards.

BNZ has been part of the New Zealand landscape for 150 years and holds close ties to Katherine Mansfield. Her father, Sir Harold Beauchamp, was a director of BNZ for 38 years, and was also the chairman of the BNZ board for 17 years.

The BNZ Literary Awards offer five levels of entry:


  • BNZ Katherine Mansfield Award, for published writers - $10,000 prize money
  • BNZ Novice Writer, for unpublished writers - $1500 prize money
  • BNZ Young Writer, for writers who are at secondary school - $1500 for the student and $2000 for the winner’s school.
  • BNZ Short Short Story, for a short story of a maximum of 150 words submitted via Facebook - $500 prize money
  • BNZ #shortandtweet, for a short story of a maximum of 140 characters submitted via Twitter - $1000 prize money

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey Graham,

Any idea when/if the short-lists will be published, if at all? I note that in past years they've had a list in the judges' reports.

Cheers,

Tim

Beattie's Book Blog said...

They were in the programme that was handed out to those present at the event. I'll see if I can track them down for you.