"This was a special and significant year for the Sunday Times Literary Awards. It marked the 30th anniversary of the coveted Alan Paton Award. Both winners showcase once again the best in South African writing and the prizes continue to signify the dedication that the Sunday Times has to our local literature," said Sunday Times books editor Jennifer Platt.
Kurgan received the Alan Paton Award for non-fiction for her book – Everyone is Present: Essays on Photography, Family and Memory (Fourthwall Books). This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Alan Paton Award – which has, over the decades, showcased the most acute and incisive non-fiction writing in South Africa.
Kurgan’s book was selected by a panel chaired by award-winning writer, journalist and filmmaker Sylvia Vollenhoven, alongside journalist Paddi Clay and Professor Tinyiko Maluleke from the Centre of Advancement of Scholarship at the University of Pretoria.
The judges called it “a compassionate, mesmerising tale of a time and place and the singular journey of remarkable people.”
The Barry Ronge Fiction Prize was awarded to Ndlovu for her book – The Theory of Flight (Penguin Fiction). The Barry Ronge Fiction Prize, now in its 19th year, honours the authors who enthral with their imagined worlds.
CONGRATULATIONS to Siphiwe Ndlovu on winning the 2019 Barry Ronge Fiction Prize at the 2019 Sunday Times Literary Awards for her debut novel The Theory of Flight! #STLitAwards2019 pic.twitter.com/kF5zdZZK35
— Penguin Books SA (@PenguinBooksSA) September 6, 2019
Kurgan and Ndlovu each receive a R100,000 prize.
