| Franz Kafka Prize | |
| Presenter: | Franz Kafka Society |
| Country: | Czech Republic |
| Reward: | $10,000 |
| Year: | 2001 |
| Website: | www.franzkafka-soc.cz |
The Franz Kafka Prize is an international literary award presented in honour of Franz Kafka, the Jewish, Bohemian, German-language novelist. The prize was first awarded in 2001 and is co-sponsored by the Franz Kafka Society and the city of Prague, Czech Republic.
At a presentation held annually in the Old Town Hall (Prague), the recipient receives $10,000, a diploma, and a bronze statuette.[1] Each award is often called the "Kafka Prize" or "Kafka Award".
The award earned some prestige in the mid 2000s by foreshadowing the Nobel Prize when two of its winners went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature the same year, Elfriede Jelinek (2004) and Harold Pinter (2005).
The criteria for winning the award include the artwork's "humanistic character and contribution to cultural, national, language [sic] and religious tolerance, its existential, timeless character, its generally human validity and its ability to hand over [sic] a testimony about our times."[2]
Previous winners.[3]
| Year | Picture | Winner | Nationality | Language(s) | Genre(s) | Ref(s) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | |||||||
| 2021 | Ivan Vyskočil (1929–2023) | Czech | novel, drama | [4] | |||
| 2020 | Milan Kundera (1929–2023) | / | French/Czech | novel, short story, poetry, essay, drama | [5] | ||
| 2019 | Pierre Michon (1945–) | French | novel, short story | ||||
| 2018 | Ivan Wernisch (1942–) | Czech | poetry, translation | [6] | |||
| 2017 | Margaret Atwood (1939–) | English | poetry, novel, short story, literary criticism, essay | [7] | |||
| 2016 | Claudio Magris (1939–) | Italian | essay, translation, novel, short story | [8] | |||
| 2015 | Eduardo Mendoza (1943–) | Spanish | novel, short story, drama, essay | [9] | |||
| 2014 | Yan Lianke (1958–) | Chinese | novel, short story | [10] | |||
| 2013 | Amos Oz (1939–2018) | Hebrew | novel, short story, essay | [11] [12] | |||
| 2012 | Daniela Hodrová (1946–) | Czech | novel | [13] | |||
| 2011 | John Banville (1945–) |  Ireland | English | novel, short story, drama, screenplay, essay | [14] | ||
| 2010 | Václav Havel (1936–2011) | Czech | poetry, drama, essay | [15] | |||
| 2009 | Peter Handke (1942–) | German | novel, poetry, essay, short story, screenplay, drama | ||||
| 2008 | Arnošt Lustig (1926–2011) | Czech | novel, short story, drama, screenplay | [16] | |||
| 2007 | Yves Bonnefoy (1923–2016) | French | poetry, essay, translation, short story, history | [17] | |||
| 2006 | Haruki Murakami (1949–) | Japanese | novel, short story, essay, memoirs | [18] | |||
| 2005 | Harold Pinter (1930–2008) | English | drama, screenplay | ||||
| 2004 | Elfriede Jelinek (1946–) | German | novel, poetry, drama, translation | ||||
| 2003 | Péter Nádas (1942–) | Hungarian | drama, essay, novel | [19] | |||
| 2002 | Ivan Klíma (1931–) | Czech | novel, drama, memoirs | [20] | |||
| 2001 | Philip Roth (1933–2018) | English | novel, short story, memoirs, essay |