An unspecified event celebrating the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Image: DLPP
By Porter Anderson, Editor in Chief | @Porter_Anderson
“It is a peace prize; it is a literary prize”
TDescribing itself as “the United States’ first and only annual literary award recognizing the power of the written word to promote peace,” the Dayton Literary Peace Prize was established in 2006. It flies far under the radar compared to many other international book and publishing awards ceremonies.
Part of the reason for this is the name, which does not make it clear that this is an international award. Many Americans assume the name refers to the city of Dayton, Ohio. In fact, the name of the program refers to the Dayton Accords, the framework for the negotiated peace pact for Bosnia and Herzegovina, an agreement signed in 1995 at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base east of Dayton in Greene and Montgomery counties, Ohio.
The literary awards program was created as a cultural complement to the adoption of the Dayton Accords. Official recognition of such significant events can often be accompanied by artistic performances and programs, including specially written and performed music and/or dance, etc. However, maintaining such well-intentioned programs can become difficult as the years pass and initial enthusiasm wanes.
We will provide more details on this below, but first we will announce the shortlists for the 2024 cycle published today (15 August).
The award is given annually in two categories, one for fiction and one for nonfiction. The winner of each category receives $10,000. The runner-up in each category receives $5,000. A new Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement honoree will be announced in September. And the nonprofit foundation that administers this program will present all of the year’s awards during weekend events on November 9 and 10 in Dayton.
The stated goal is to honor authors “whose work uses the power of the written word to promote peace, social justice and global understanding.”
Shortlist for Fiction for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize 2024
Three of six independent publishers will be honored in the jury’s selection in the fiction category.
Publish perspectives Readers will note that Irish author Paul Lynch’s Song of the Prophet– for which he won the London Booker Prize for Fiction 2023 in November – is among the nominated fiction titles, as is Janika Oza’s A history of burningwhich received far less attention on the international awards stage.
When we asked, the program’s press officer told us that Peter Ho Davies and Margaret Lazarus Dean are the two “lead judges” for the fiction prize. It is unclear whether they work with a panel of fellow judges or simply with each other in this selection.
Shortlist for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize 2024 (Non-Fiction)
In the non-fiction section, three of the titles shortlisted by the jury also come from the lists of independent publishers.
In this case, several of these titles, including the book by Darrin Bell and Who is believedare known to many of our readers from the professional publishing industry, as is the journalist Tania Branigans Red memory, This book is known to many because it was nominated for the British Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction.
When we asked, the program’s press officer told us that Kali Fajardo-Austine and Michael Parker are the “lead judges” for the nonfiction selections. And as with fiction, it’s unclear whether they work with a panel of fellow judges on these selections or simply among themselves.
The place of the Dayton Prize among global awards
The draft of the Dayton Agreement was initialled in November 1995 during talks at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base east of Dayton, Ohio. The final version of the agreement was signed in Paris on December 14, 1995. Image: Public domain
As Publish perspectives As readers know, the various book and publishing awards of the international book publishing business seek to generate enormous press coverage. To a certain extent, the real competition is not between books, authors or publishers, but between the organizers of various competitions, many of which require grants and sponsors.
Beyond the constraints of the name Dayton Literary Peace Prize, this awards program today lifted the embargo on its 2024 shortlists, though in some ways it seems as unprepared for its own moment as it is overlooked by many who fail to recognize its importance. Its website announces a call for entries for the very year (2024) for which the shortlists are announced today. The homepage announces Sandra Cisneros as the winner of the Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award in 2023, but there is no news on those 2024 shortlists.
The winners of last year’s competition are known, but this year’s finalists are not, and there is no information about this year’s judges. This dissonance could of course have been avoided by simply updating the site before the announcement, or holding back the press material until the site is ready. As it is, the program seems to be in a bit of a drift, and that’s probably not the kind of optics the organizers would prefer.
It must be emphasized that the Dayton Literary Peace Prize program is in a somewhat difficult position. It was created for a purpose other than literary awards—or at least in addition to them.
It was created in recognition of the Dayton Agreement, which is of course admirable. In fact, in a discussion of its creation on the website (which we are informed will be updated), we read: “The Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation is the successor to the Dayton Peace Prize.” In a discussion of the judging process, we also find this line: “The Dayton Literary Peace Prize has a dual nature: it is a peace prize and a literary prize.” The judging process, we read, uses “librarians, professors, journalists, former generals and peace activists” to judge six at a time as “first readers.”
In an industry where competition for press coverage of book and publishing prizes is so fierce, the structure and protocols of the Dayton Prize program may be different from many others, but this prize program’s dependence on the literary industry is not. Many in the book industry certainly wish the Dayton Literary Peace Prize well, but they may also hope that it recognizes and adheres to the requirements and standards expected of the best book and publishing competitions in other countries and in other contexts.
For more information from Publishing Perspectives on the many book and publishing awards ceremonies in the international industry in general, click here, and for more on the US market, click here.
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