The winner of the Nordic Council Children and Young People’s Literature Prize 2017

Vinnare av Nordiska rådets barn och ungdommslitteraturpris 2017
Photographer
Magnus Fröderberg/norden.org
The Nordic Council Children and Young People’s Literature Prize 2017 has been awarded to the author Ulf Stark and illustrator Linda Bondestam for Djur som ingen sett utom vi ("Animals Nobody Has Seen Except Us", not translated into English).

Ulf Stark’s widow, Janina Orlov, and Linda Bondestam accepted the prize at the award ceremony in Finlandia Hall, Helsinki, on 1 November.

The Adjudication Committee wrote:

Djur som ingen sett utom vi is Nordic co-operation in its finest form. Author Ulf Stark and illustrator Linda Bondestam have created a truly unique book. The colourful pictures and pithy and melancholy poems about mysterious animals create a world in which the focus is on the essence of existence. Ulf Stark, who receives the prize posthumously, poured all of the wisdom accumulated during his life into the text. The book is a literary testament but its tolerance is a pointer to the future as well. Linda Bondestam’s illustrations, with their deep red skies and intense blue-green forests, sea and mountains, bear witness to an artist who goes from strength to strength with each book. This is great poetry and great art, a consummate piece of work, life-affirming and glorious.”