Author Lee Mirinae becomes first Korean awarded the William Saroyan International Prize

Author Lee Mirinae, 41, won a William Saroyan International Prize for her novel "8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster" on Sunday.

Author Lee Mirinae wrote the “8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster” which was awarded the William Saroyan International Prize for Fiction on Sunday. [WISDOM HOUSE]

Author Lee Mirinae, 41, won a William Saroyan International Prize for her novel "8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster" on Sunday.

She is the first Korean to be recognized by the American literary award which spotlights emerging authors in fiction and nonfiction every two years.

Judges described her book as “A beautifully complex story of human frailty and strength," and that Lee's characters are "so fascinating that the need to decipher them and unravel their mysteries generates unexpected suspense, but her lyrical and evocative prose simultaneously demands a slow savoring of each page."

Cover of Lee Mirinae's “8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster” [WISDOM HOUSE]

The novel unfolds as the narrator who works at a nursing home in Korea delves into the many lives of Ms. Mook, a bad-tempered dementia patient. Ms. Mook's stories take readers across countries from a Pyongyang farming village under Japanese colonial rule to a brothel in Indonesia and then back to South Korea, spanning the length of modern Korean history.

The book was published in the United States and Britain in May last year under HarperCollins Publishers.

Jointly hosted by the Saroyan Foundation and Stanford University Libraries, William Saroyan International Prize was established in 2003 in honor of the late American novelist and playwright William Saroyan (1908–1981). Previous winners in the fiction category include Nicole Krauss for "The History of Love" (2005) and 2023 Pulitzer Prize winner Hernan Diaz for "In the Distance" (2017).

BY LEE JIAN [lee.jian@joongang.co.kr]