Winner of ALMA 2009 Will Be Announced March 24

On March 24th, at 13.00 CET, the recipient of the 2009 award will be announced. From the Netherlands, Dick Bruna, Guus Kuijer, Toon Tellegen, Thé Tjong-Khing, Joke van Leeuwen, Kinderboekenmuseum's Gravenhage and the National Reading Aloud Contest are nominated.

Astrid Lindgren is Sweden’s favourite author and one of the world’s most popular. She passed away in 2002 at the age of 94, but her stories will live forever. To honour her memory and promote children’s and youth literature around the world, the Swedish government has founded an international prize in her name: The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.

Previous recipients are Maurice Sendak (2003), USA; Christine Nöstlinger (2003), Austria; Lygia Bojunga (2004), Brazil; Ryôji Arai (2005), Japan; Philip Pullman (2005), United Kingdom; Katherine Paterson (2006), USA; Banco del Libro (2007), Venezuela and Sonya Hartnett (2008), Australia.

The award, of five million Swedish crowns, is the world’s largest for children’s and youth literature, and the second-largest literature prize in the world.

Illustrations are at least as important as words in most children’s books, and many such books have strong roots in oral storytelling. That is why it is so natural that the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award is more than just a literature prize. Or rather it is a literature prize in the widest possible sense of the phrase. Not only authors are eligible. Illustrators, story-tellers and people or organisations that make valuable contributions to the promotion of reading can also be recognised.

Few have done as much for children’s right to be children, and for their imaginations, as Astrid Lindgren. She was always on the children’s side. Fearless as Pippi Longstocking. As imaginative as Emil in the Soup Tureen. Compassionate like the brothers Lionheart.

This award in Astrid Lindgren's name aims to give children’s and youth literature the place it deserves in the world. The prize can attract new, gifted story-tellers, authors and illustrators and encourage them to create good literature.

The prize is also a signal to institutions and organisations around the world that good children’s and youth literature is worth millions. And our children are worth more than millions.
Good children’s literature gives the child a place in the world, and the world a place in the child.

Read more about the prize on the ALMA-website

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