Alexis Wright has won the Miles Franklin Literary Award a second time with her 700-page epic Praiseworthy.
The win makes Wright the first Aboriginal woman to join an elite list of two-time winners of the prestigious $60,000 award, her earlier novel Carpentaria winning in 2007. Even that first win was a miracle according to Wright, who said she was deeply humbled by the announcement on Thursday. "You don't expect to win a Miles Franklin, and to do it twice is quite unbelievable," she told AAP.
Wright, from the Waanyi people of the south of the Gulf of Carpentaria, explains the novel is written in an "Aboriginal chord" akin to the rhythm of women singing ceremony, with a beat that comes from the earth. It's a big and challenging book, she acknowledges, but says novels like this are necessary as humans confront a future of global warming, inequality and displacement.
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