CKCU Literary News
Wednesday November 11th, 2020 with Hans G. Ruprecht and Friederike Knabe
Souvankham Thammavongsa, winner of the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

The jury of the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize is comprised of Canadian authors Mark Sakamoto (jury chair), Eden Robinson and David Chariandy, Canadian British novelist Tom Rachman and literary critic for The Guardian, Claire Armitstead. It chose «How to Pronounce Knife» from 118 submitted works for this year’s award. 🔹Of the winning book, the jury wrote:  "How to Pronounce Knife is a stunning collection of stories that portray the immigrant experience in achingly beautiful prose. The emotional expanse chronicled in this collection is truly remarkable. These stories are vessels of hope, of hurt, of rejection, of loss and of finding one's footing in a new and strange land. Thammavongsa's fiction cuts to the core of the immigrant reality like a knife – however you pronounce it." Souvankham Thammavongsa is the author of four poetry books: Light, winner of the Trillium Book Award for Poetry;  Found; Small Arguments, winner of the ReLit Award; and, most recently, Cluster. Her fiction has appeared in Harper's, Granta, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, Ploughshares, Best American Non-Required Reading, The Journey Prize Stories, and The O. Henry Prize Stories. How to Pronounce Knife is her debut book of fiction, and the title story was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Born in the Lao refugee camp in Nong Khai, Thailand, she was raised and educated in Toronto, where she is at work on her first novel. https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/souvankham-thammavongsa-wins-the-2020-scotiabank-giller-prize-822139016.html Souvankham Thammavongsa is the author of four poetry books: Light, winner of the Trillium Book Award for Poetry; Found; Small Arguments, winner of the ReLit Award; and, most recently, Cluster. Her fiction has appeared in Harper’s, Granta, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, Ploughshares, Best American Non-Required Reading, The Journey Prize Stories, and The O. Henry Prize Stories. How to Pronounce Knife is her debut book of fiction, and the title story was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Born in the Lao refugee camp in Nong Khai, Thailand, she was raised and educated in Toronto, where she is at work on her first novel. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/authors/2189810/souvankham-thammavongsa