Nino Kharatishvili's 'Eighth Life' nominated for International Booker Prize

Award-winning Georgian author Nino Kharatishvili's novel The Eighth Life (for Brilka) was chosen on Thursday to compete for the prestigious International Booker Prize award.

The prize is awarded every year for a single book that is translated into English and published in the UK or Ireland; it envisages the celebration of the finest translated fiction around the world. 

Kharatishvili’s The Eighth Life has been selected alongside 12 other novels, including the work by renowned modern writer Michel Houellebecq. This year the judges considered 124 books.

The novel takes as its subject matter the saga of a Georgian family on the fringes of the Russian and Soviet empires. The Guardian speaks of Nino’s work as “harrowing, heartening and utterly engrossing epic novel”.

Head of Literature and Spoken Word at the Southbank Center, and the Chair for this year’s panel of judges, Ted Hodgkinson said: “Whether reimagining foundational myths, envisioning dystopias of disquieting potency, or simply setting the world ablaze with the precision of their perceptions, these are books that left indelible impressions on us as judges. In times that increasingly ask us to take sides, these works of art transcend moral certainties and narrowing identities, restoring a sense of the wonderment at the expansive and ambiguous lot of humanity.”

The shortlist for the 2020 International Booker Prize will be announced on Thursday, 2 April, with the winner revealed at a later date.

The Booker Prizes are sponsored by Crankstart, the charitable foundation of Sir Michael Moritz and his wife, Harriet Heyman.