Salman Rushdie's memoir about his stabbing, 'Knife', nominated for National Book Award – Firstpost

Salman Rushdie’s “Knife: Meditations after an attempted murder”, his explicit and surprisingly resilient memoir about his brutal stabbing in 2022, is nominated for the National Book Awards. Canadian Anne Carson, one of the world’s most revered poets, has been nominated for her latest collection, “Wrong Norma.”

The National Book Foundation, which gives out the awards, released long lists of 10 nominees for nonfiction and poetry on Thursday. The foundation announced the lists for young adult literature and books in translation earlier this week and will announce the nominees for fiction on Friday. Judges will narrow the lists to five in each category on Oct. 1, and the winners will be announced during a dinner ceremony in Manhattan on Nov. 20.

Rushdie, 77, has been in the spotlight since the publication of “Midnight Children” and involuntarily famous since the release of “The Satanic Verses“ and the death sentence of the Iranian Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini because of the alleged blasphemy of the novel. But “Knife” earned him his first nomination for the National Book Award; he was a British citizen and lived in London, for “Midnight Children” and other works and would not have been eligible to play in the NBA. Rushdie has been a US citizen since 2016.

In addition to “Knife,” the list of nonfiction books also includes explorations of faith, identity, oppression, global resources and space, including “There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension” by Hanif Abdurraqib, “Our Moon: How Earth's Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are” by Rebecca Boyle and “Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling” by Jason De León.

The other nominees in the nonfiction category were: “Circle of Hope: A Reckoning with Love, Power, and Justice in an American Church” by Eliza Griswold, “Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia” by Kate Manne, “The War Below: Lithium, Copper, and the Global Battle to Power Our Lives” by Ernest Scheyder, “A Great Disorder: National Myth and the Battle for America” by Richard Slotkin, “Whiskey Tender” by Deborah Jackson Taffa, and “Magical/Realism: Essays on Music, Memory, Fantasy, and Borders” by Vanessa Angélica Villarreal.

In addition to Carson's “Wrong Norma,” the nominees for the poetry category include Pulitzer Prize winner Dianne Seuss's latest work, “Modern Poetry,” Fady Joudah's elliptically titled “(…),” Dorianne Laux's “Life on Earth,” Gregory Pardlo's “Spectral Evidence,” and Rowan Ricardo Phillips' “Silver.”

Other poems on the list included “The Book of Wounded Sparrows” by Octavio Quintanilla, “Mother” by Ms. RedCherries, “Something About Living” by Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, and “Liontaming in America” by Elizabeth Willis.