{"id":214269,"date":"2025-06-25T22:25:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T22:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/214269\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T22:25:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T22:25:10","slug":"orwell-prize-for-political-writing-awarded-to-novelist-killed-in-ukraine-war-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/214269\/","title":{"rendered":"Orwell prize for political writing awarded to novelist killed in Ukraine war | Books"},"content":{"rendered":"

A novelist killed in the Ukraine war has won the Orwell prize<\/a> for political writing.<\/p>\n

Victoria Amelina<\/a>, who died in July 2023 from injuries sustained in a Russian bombing of a restaurant in Kramatorsk, won the prize with her unfinished book Looking at Women Looking at War.<\/p>\n

Photograph: PR<\/p>\n

The book \u2013 Amelina\u2019s only work of nonfiction \u2013 documents the resistance efforts of Ukrainian women, including a soldier, a human rights activist and a librarian. \u201cThe effect is of an ensemble of female voices, not a solo aria\u201d, wrote Charlotte Higgins in a Guardian review<\/a>. The book is \u201can important piece of testimony and a precious, powerful work of literature: a steady beam of light born amid darkness and violence\u201d.<\/p>\n

Amelina \u201cbrings to her narrative the acuity of a journalist and the artistry of a born writer, making her a true heir of George Orwell\u201d, said judging chair Kim Darroch.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Irish writer Donal Ryan was awarded the Orwell prize for political fiction for Heart, Be at Peace, which is set in rural Ireland and told in 21 voices. The book is a follow-up to his debut The Spinning Heart, which won the 2013 Guardian first book award.<\/p>\n

The mosaic of voices in Heart, Be at Peace becomes \u201ca kind of simulacrum of life, as if we have been landed in this village, have a chance to overhear its inhabitants\u2019 most private thoughts, move from one house to another, sit in the pub, discover who believes who is to blame for what, and what can be excused or forgiven,\u201d wrote Erica Wagner in her Guardian review<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"Heart, Photograph: Penguin<\/p>\n

\u201cHere is a small deprived community in rural Ireland \u2013 after the Good Friday Peace Accord and the collapse of the Celtic Tiger \u2013 suffering and recovering from the bruises of its political and economic past,\u201d said fiction prize judging chair Jim Crace. \u201cThe boom years \u2013 in both senses of that word, might be over \u2013 but, in Donal Ryan\u2019s exceptional Heart, Be at Peace, the echoes still reverberate and hum.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amelina and Ryan were announced as the winners at a ceremony in London on Wednesday evening, coinciding with Orwell\u2019s birthday. Each prize is worth \u00a33,000. Amelina\u2019s husband, Alex, accepted the award on her behalf, and her prize money will go towards supporting the festival she started in Ukraine, New York Literary festival. New York is the town in Donetsk where Alex is from.<\/p>\n

When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Amelina was working on a novel, but soon pivoted to poetry and nonfiction writing. She had sent the latest draft<\/a> of Looking at Women Looking at War to a friend shortly before she was killed.<\/p>\n

After her death at 37, a group of writers along with Alex arranged the material \u2013 which they estimated to be about 60% of what Amelina had planned \u2013 into a readable version, adding footnotes and sometimes inserting material from earlier drafts.<\/p>\n

Joining Darroch on the political writing judging panel was sociologist Colin Crouch, former MP Thangam Debbonaire, historian Katja Hoyer and journalist Cindy Yu. On the fiction panel Crace judged alongside journalist Laura Battle, literature professor Matthew Beaumont and writer Anita Sethi.<\/p>\n

Last year, Hisham Matar won the fiction prize<\/a> for My Friends, while Matthew Longo took home the nonfiction award for The Picnic.<\/p>\n

Looking at Women, Looking at War<\/a> by Victoria Amelina is published by HarperCollins (\u00a320) and Heart, Be at Peace<\/a> by Donal Ryan by Transworld (\u00a39.99). To support the Guardian, order your copies at guardianbookshop.com<\/a>. Delivery charges may apply.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A novelist killed in the Ukraine war has won the Orwell prize for political writing. Victoria Amelina, who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214270,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[2000,299,657],"class_list":{"0":"post-214269","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-ukraine"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114746354924091867","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214269\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}