JCB Prize 2018 shortlist announced; top five includes books by Perumal Murugan, Anuradha Roy

The shortlist for this year's The JCB Prize for Literature has been announced and includes a range of writers — from a first-time author to a former Booker Prize nominee. The top-five entries vying for this year's honour are Perumal Murugan's Poonachi, Anuradha Roy's All the Lives We Never Lived, Amitabha Bagchi's Half the Night is Gone, Shubhangi Swarup's Latitudes of Longing and Benyamin's Jasmine Days.The noted author and playwright Vivek Shanbhag and translator Arshia Sattar were roped in as the jury for this year's selection. Shanbhag who was present at the announcement event along with Sattar, said, "Good literature is always such that you read it five years later and it tells you something more. All these five books have that quality."Speaking about the debut novelist Shubhangi Swarup and her book Latitude of Longing, Sattar said, "If it's going to become a new trend, I'm very excited." Shanbhag too applauded Swarup for her courage shown in her very first book.Also read — The anatomy of Indian literary prizes: Who writes the award-winning books in India?In regards to other books like Anuradha Roy's All the Lives We Never Lived, Sattar opined that it "is more than about the freedom struggle, it's about personal emancipation." She also praised Amitabha Bagchi's Half the Night is Gone claiming it to be a kind of a book that she hasn't read in years.The final announcement of the winner of 2018's JCB Prize for Literature is slated to be made on 24 October.