The winner of the 2024 International Booker Prize is KAIROS by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated by Michael Hofmann. Erpenbeck becomes the first German writer to win the prize (she was longlisted in 2018), and Hofmann is the first male translator to win it.
The novel, which was originally written in German, follows a destructive affair between a young woman and an older man in 1980s East Berlin, with the two lovers seemingly embodying East Germany’s crushed idealism. A meditation on hope and disappointment, KAIROS poses complex questions about freedom, loyalty, love and power.
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