Tomás Eloy Martínez
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Tomás Eloy Martínez was an Argentine journalist, writer and professor
His first novel and first book of chronicles were published in Buenos Aires between 1968 and 1973. During the military dictatorship, he lived in exile in Venezuela where he wrote three other books, all of which were republished in Argentina in 1983 in the first months of democracy.
Since then he has written The Peron Novel and The Master’s Hand, followed by Santa Evita, which became an instant No.1 bestseller when it was published in Argentina.
He was awarded the Guggenheim and Woodrow Wilson fellowships and won the 2002 Premio Alfaguara de Novela for the novel Flight of the Queen.
In 1984 he moved to the United States and became a professor at the University of Maryland as well as helping launch, and contributing to, magazines and newspapers. In the late 90s, he became a professor and the director of Latin American studies at Rutgers University, New Jersey.
He was shortlisted, for his entire body of work, for The Man Booker International Prize 2005.
Background
Between 2005 - 2015, the Man Booker International Prize recognised one writer for their achievement in fiction.
Worth £60,000, the prize was awarded every two years to a living author who had published fiction either originally in English or whose work is generally available in translation in the English language.
The winner was chosen solely at the discretion of the judging panel and there were no submissions from publishers.
The Man Booker International Prize was different from the annual Man Booker Prize for Fiction in that it highlighted one writer’s overall contribution to fiction on the world stage. In focusing on overall literary excellence, the judges considered a writer’s body of work rather than a single novel.