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Edmund de Waal to chair Wellcome Book Prize
Artist and writer Edmund de Waal is to chair the judging panel for the 2018 Wellcome Book Prize which celebrates "exceptional books that engage with the topics of health and medicine and the many ways they touch our lives".
De Waal is joined on the panel by Dr Hannah Critchlow, neuroscientist and Science Outreach Fellow at Magdalene College, University of Cambridge; Bryony Gordon, journalist, author and mental health campaigner; Sumit Paul-Choudhury, editor-in-chief of New Scientist; and Sophie Ratcliffe, writer, critic and associate professor of English literature at the University of Oxford.
The judging panel will select a longlist of up to 12 books in February 2018, followed by a shortlist of six books in March 2018, and the winner will be announced at a ceremony at Wellcome Collection in April 2018.
The £30,000 prize is open to new fiction and non-fiction books published in the UK between 1st January 2017 and 31st December 2017. Submissions for the 2018 prize must be received by 5pm today, Friday 8 September. The submission form can be found on the prize's website.
De Waal said: “It’s a privilege to have been asked to chair the 2018 Wellcome Book Prize alongside such esteemed fellow judges. The prize celebrates the infinite ways we can connect with the themes of health and medicine through reading, and I have no doubt that we will be entertained, challenged and moved by this year’s submissions. I am looking forward to discussing these books with the panel, as we explore this dynamic relationship between art, science and the human experience.”
Kirty Topiwala, publisher at Wellcome Collection and Wellcome Book Prize manager, said: “We couldn’t be more thrilled to announce Edmund de Waal as the chair of the 2018 Wellcome Book Prize, alongside a talented panel of judges. Each judge will bring something different and valuable to the deliberations. I can’t wait to see what Edmund, Hannah, Bryony, Sumit and Sophie choose for their longlist.”
Mend the Living by Maylis de Kerangal, translated by Jessica Moore (MacLehose Press) was chosen as the winner of the Wellcome Book Prize 2017.
