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Bhattacharya, Hailey and Toldy win Desmond Elliott residencies
The National Centre for Writing has announced that Santanu Bhattacharya, Carole Hailey and Csilla Toldy are the winners of the Desmond Elliott Residencies 2023, which are fully funded writing residencies for debut fiction writers.
Bhattacharya is the author of One Small Voice (Fig Tree), Hailey the author of The Silence Project (Corvus), and Toldy the author of Bed Table Door (Wrecking Ball Press).
The Desmond Elliott Residencies were open to fiction writers based in the UK or Ireland who published their first novel between 1st April 2022 and 31st March 2023. Each writer will spend a fully funded week at the National Centre for Writing (NCW) Cottage, Dragon Hall in the heart of Norwich. The residencies will take place in August.
A legacy of the Desmond Elliott Prize are the residencies that support writers at the beginning of their careers, offering the space and time to write and the opportunity to connect with Norwich’s literature community.
Laura Stimson, programme manager, said: “It is wonderful to support early career authors through the legacy of the Desmond Elliott Prize. In this age of overload and distraction it’s increasingly hard for writers to dedicate time and money to their art. With writing time at the heart of this residency, and no financial commitment to the writer, it feels especially important to offer this opportunity. We look forward to welcoming Carole, Csilla and Santanu to our home here at Dragon Hall.”
Bhattacharya grew up in India and studied at the University of Oxford and National University of Singapore. He is the winner of the 2021 Mo Siewcharran Prize, the Life Writing Prize and a London Writers’ Awards, and his works have been nominated for the 4thWrite Prize, Blue Pencil Agency First Novel Award, and Pontas/JJ Bola Emerging Writers’ Prize.
He said: “I am grateful for this very special opportunity to immerse myself in writing, and to spend time in the city of Norwich among literature enthusiasts.”
Hailey studied an MA in Creative Writing at Goldsmiths followed by a PhD in Creative Writing at Swansea University. She was a London Library Emerging Writer 2020/21. The Silence Project (Corvus) is her first published novel and was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize Peggy Chapman-Andrews First Novel Award 2020 and highly commended by the judges. It was a 2023 BBC Radio 4 Book Club pick.
She said: “I am incredibly grateful to have won a Desmond Elliott residency. The opportunity to spend time at Dragon Hall Cottage could not come at a more welcome time in my fledgling career as an author. Having my debut novel published earlier this year was a wonderful experience but I’m now focusing on my next project and I’m very excited to have an opportunity to work on it at the National Centre for Writing.”
Toldy is a writer and translator from Hungary. Her short fiction and poetry have appeared in numerous UK and Irish literary magazines and anthologies, and she has published books of short fiction, poetry and memoir with Lapwing Publications Belfast. Her poetry translations from German and Hungarian were published in Modern Poetry in Translation, Cyphers and Pamenar Magazine.
She said: “I am honoured to receive this residency for my novel Bed Table Door, which deals with issues of personal and political freedom in a divided world during the 1980s.
“The novel had an awfully long journey to achieve publication, partly because of my personal circumstances – having to work for a living while I am writing. Without the courage of my publisher Shane Rhodes at Wrecking Ball Press, I would not be here. This prize acknowledges the work of indie publishers who discover and provide a platform for new voices in publishing. They are heavily reliant on public funding, which I hope will never dry out.
“Many thanks to the National Centre for Writing who established this prize in the name of the late Desmond Elliott, supporting debut novelists. This residency will provide me with the space and time to focus on my next project, for which I am immensely grateful.”
