Press release -
The world’s largest award (EUR 570 000) for children and young adult literature to be announced on March 27
The countdown has started. Following the jury’s final meeting on March 27, the laureate or laureates of the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (ALMA) 2018 will be announced. This is the world's largest and most prestigious award for children's and young adult literature. The announcement takes place simultaneously in Stockholm and Bologna and is also broadcast live.
The prize, which amounts to EUR 570 000, is awarded annually to a single recipient or to several. It rewards works or activities of the highest quality but the laureates must also embrace the humanistic values that the Swedish author Astrid Lindgren treasured. So far, seventeen laureates have been awarded, including Philip Pullman (2005), Kitty Crowther (2010), Shaun Tan (2011) and Barbro Lindgren (2014). Last year’s laureate is the German illustrator Wolf Erlbruch.
This year, 235 candidates from 60 countries are in the running for the world’s largest and most prestigious children’s literature award. The complete list of nominated writers, illustrators, reading promoters and storytellers is available here.
The announcement of the 2018 laureate takes place on Tuesday March 27 1:00 pm CEST at Filmhuset (The Film House) in Stockholm. Jury Chairman Boel Westin will announce the laureate or the laureates and Alice Bah Kuhnke, Minister for Culture and Democracy in Sweden is giving a speech. The announcement will be followed by a presentation of the laureate by the jury.
Follow the announcement live on alma.se/en and in Bologna Children's Book Fair, the leading international book fair for children and young people.
Topics
The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (ALMA) is the world's largest award for children's and young adult literature. The award, which amounts to SEK 5 million, is given annually to a single laureate or to several. Authors, illustrators, oral storytellers and reading promoters are eligible. The award is designed to promote interest in children's and young adult literature. The UN convention of rights of the child is the foundation of our work. An expert jury selects the laureate(s) from candidates nominated by institutions and organisations all over the world. The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award was founded by the Swedish government in 2002 and is administrated by the Swedish Arts Council.
