Canadian Indigenous writer Lee Maracle nominated for prestigious Neustadt Prize

Canadian Indigenous writer Lee Maracle is among nine finalists for the US$50,000 Neustadt International Prize for Literature.

The poet and author from Vancouver, a member of the Sto:Lo nation, has been nominated for “Celia’s Song,” published by Cormorant Books in 2014.

The Neustadt is awarded every other year to a work of poetry, fiction or drama that has significantly contributed to world literature.

Sponsored by the University of Oklahoma and its magazine World Literature Today, the award has been nicknamed the “American Nobel” because more than 30 laureates, finalists and jurors have gone on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

The winner of the 2020 Neustadt Prize, worth about C$65,500, will be announced at a reception in Norman, Okla., on Oct. 16.