The Big Book Prize 2010

 

The winners of the Big Book Prize for 2010 were announced on 23 November at the award ceremony at Pashkov Dom. First Prize was awarded to Pavel Basinsky (Lev Tolstoy: Flight from Paradise / Лев Толстой: бегство из рая). Second Prize was awarded to Alexander Ilichevsky (The Persian / Перс). Third Prize was awarded to Victor Pelevin (T).

 

The winner of the First Prize receives three million roubles, the Second, one and a half million roubles and the Third, one million roubles. 

 

The winner of the Readers' Vote was Victor Pelevin for his novel T. Second place went to Evgeny Kluev for Andemanir Shtuck and third to Mikhail Gigolashvili for The Ferris Wheel

 

Anton Chekhov was commended with the special Big Book Prize for his Contribution to Literature. The prize was received by Vladimir Kataev, Chair of the Chekhov Committee at the Russian Academy of Science. 

 

 

Pavel Basinsky’s Leo Tolstoy: Flight from Paradise came out in the middle of July 2010 and within two months had already been reprinted twice. According to sales figures from some of the largest Russian bookshops such as Moskva, Biblioglobus and Moscow House of Books, Flight from Paradise ranks among the top ten most popular books for Summer-Autumn 2010.

 

Flight from Paradise presents not just a new version of Tolstoy’s secret flight from Yasnaya Polyana and his sudden death, but a vivid and in-depth reconstruction, based strictly on archival and documentary evidence. We follow Tolstoy’s escape step by step, learning the reasons behind his tragic family situation and the secrets surrounding the signing of his will. These events are placed in context of Tolstoy’s fascinating life story, key moments from which are reconstructed and explored. The book is richly illustrated with rare photographs from the Tolstoy Estate Museum at Yasnaya Polyana.