Russian propagandist’s book retroactively added to Big Book longlist

A book by Margarita Simonyan, Editor-in-Chief of Russia Today TV channel, was added to the longlist for the Big Book Prize after the list had already been officially announced.

A novel by Simonyan , "In the Beginning Was the Word – in the End There Will Be the Digit,” appeared as entry number 25 in the “Fiction” category. Its inclusion was not reflected in the initial materials released by the award’s organizers, Kommersant reports.

Previously, the prize’s press office had circulated an official communiqué to Kommersant enumerating the works selected for the longlist.

That version, as well as the official website of the award, included 39 works in total, among them 10 in the “Non-fiction” category—a figure that remains unchanged. The same list was presented publicly during a press conference at TASS on April 22.

By April 23, however, Simonyan’s book had been added. The updated list published on the award’s website now includes 40 works overall, with 30 authors represented in the “Fiction” category.

Other authors on the longlist reportedly noticed the addition of a new entry late in the evening or overnight. As of now, the organizers of the Big Book Prize have not commented on the revision to the list of nominees.

Established in 2005 by the Center for the Support of Russian Literature, the Big Book Prize is backed by a consortium of state, public, and media institutions. The award is conferred annually to honor the finest work of prose written in the Russian language, irrespective of genre. It stands as the most prestigious literary distinction in Russia and across the former Soviet states, and ranks second globally by prize fund, surpassed only by the Nobel Prize in Literature.

The laureate of the first prize is awarded 3 million rubles, while the second- and third-place recipients receive 1.5 million and 1 million rubles, respectively. The winners are traditionally announced in November in Moscow. In addition, a parallel readers’ choice component invites the public to cast votes online, with the three most popular titles receiving commemorative statuettes.

By Vafa Guliyeva