The jury’ s reasoning for choosing this year’s award winners:
"Ryôji Arai (Japan) is an illustrator with a style all of his own: bold, mischievous and unpredictable. His picturebooks glow with warmth, playful good humour and an audacious spontaneity that appeals to children and adults alike. In adventure after adventure, colour flows through his hands in an almost musical way. As a medium for conveying stories to children, his art is at once genuine and truly poetic, encouraging children to paint and to tell their own stories".
"Philip Pullman (United Kingdom) is a master storyteller in a number of genres – from historical novels and fantasy to social realism and highly amusing parodies. With inventiveness, linguistic brilliance and psychological insight he creates and explores his own worlds without losing focus on here and now. Through his strong characters he stands firmly on the side of young people, ruthlessly questioning authority and proclaiming humanism and the power of love whilst maintaining an optimistic belief in the child even in the darkest of situations".
Press photographs and further information about the award winners can be found at the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award website www.alma.se, and the award winners websites: www.office303.co.jp:16080/ryoji-arai and www.philip-pullman.com. The press material is also available in French, German, Japanese, Spanish and Swedish. Biobibliography is enclosed.
Now in its third year, the award will be presented, like previous years, by HRH Crown Princess Victoria at the prize ceremony on 25 May at Skansen in Stockholm.
The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (ALMA), established by the Swedish Government in 2002, is the world’s largest children’s and young people’s literary award. The annual international prize of SEK 5 million (equivalent to approx. USD 730,000, 545,000 Euros) may be awarded to authors, illustrators, narrators and promoters of reading whose work reflects the spirit of Astrid Lindgren. The object of the award is to increase interest in children’s and young people’s literature, and to promote children’s rights on a global level. The award is administered by The Swedish National Council for Cultural Affairs.
Last year's award winner was the Brazilian author, Lygia Bojunga. In 2003 the award went to the Austrian author Christine Nöstlinger and the American illustrator and author, Maurice Sendak.
CONTACT:
Mr Larry Lempert
Chairman of the Award Jury
E-Mail: +46 (0)70 463 12 20
E-post: larry.lempert@kultur.stockholm.se
Mrs Anna Cokorilo
Director, Award Office
Phone: +46 (0)70 602 51 15, +46 (0)8 519 264 00/08
E-Mail: anna.cokorilo@alma.se
Mrs Helene Komlos Grill
Information Officer, Award Office
Phone: +46 (0)73 360 46 94, +46 (0)8 519 264 00/06
E-Mail: helene.komlos.grill@alma.se
Mr Per Svenson
Press Officer, The Swedish National Council for Cultural Affairs
Phone: +46 (0)70 397 76 80, +46 (0)8 519 264 00/49
E-Mail: per.svenson@kulturradet.se
RYÔJI ARAI
Japanese illustrator, born in Yamagata in 1956 and resident in Tokyo. Studied art at Nippon University. His production of picturebooks is both large and varied – from small books for toddlers, to picturebooks of nonsense, fairytales and poetry, both with his own texts and those of other writers. He has also worked with advertising, magazine illustration and theatre set design. His illustrated books have won him a number of awards in his native Japan and around the world; the newcomer's prize Fourth Choice in Japan 1986, the Grand Award for new illustrators 1990, the publisher Shogakkan's 1997 award for children's literature for Uso tsuki no tsuki ("The Lying Moon"), the Special Award at the 1999 Bologna Book Fair for Nazo nazo no tabi ("A Journey of Riddles") together with Chihiro Ishizu, and the 31st picturebook award from the publisher Kodansha for Mori no ehon ("A Forest Picture Book", 1999) together with the poet Hiroshi Osada.
I thought that somewhere in your text there must be a hope that the sun will rise. So I illustrated that hope.
Ryôji Arai in conversation with the poet Akira Ono in Spoon, Dec. 2004
Biobibliography Ryôji Arai (255 kB)
PHILIP PULLMAN
British author, born in Norwich, England, 1946. Philip Pullman is best known for his fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials, yet his work covers a number of other genres. Pullman radically injects new life into fantasy by introducing a variety of alternative worlds and by allowing good and evil to become ambiguous. His historical Sally Lockhart thrillers are set in Victorian England, and present a young woman of unusual strength and independence – qualities also characteristic of his other heroines, not least Lyra in His Dark Materials. Pullman has also written contemporary realistic novel for young people, and a number of skilfully retold fairy tales, often in parody form. In each of these genres he combines storytelling and psychological insight of the highest order. The recipient of numerous awards, Philip Pullman was the first ever writer of literature for children and young people to win the Whitbread Book of the Year Award in 2001.
Biobibliography Philip Pullman (257kB)