When The Earthshot Prize (TEP), an ambitious global initiative to protect and restore our planet, comes to Singapore this year, it will do so with an event sure to capture global imagination. On 7 November Prince William, its philanthropic founder, will travel there and present winners with catalytic prizes that scale their environmental solutions. TEP was established in 2020 to honour individuals taking on global challenges with measurable and scalable solutions; its name comes from former US president John F Kennedy’s 1962 “Moonshot” speech that challenged Americans to achieve what seemed impossible; now an annual event!
TEP will host local activations to inform and engage the public in learning more about these “planetary heroes”. These activations events include an exclusive book fair, talks between TEP winners and eco-hero counterparts from Singapore’s public and private sectors as well as other local partners; interactive community clean-up activities; as well as community art workshops.
This year’s Singapore Prize shortlist contains books on an eclectic variety of subjects. Many take an intimate approach, such as Hidayah Amin’s Leluhur: Singapore’s Kampong Gelam by Hidayah Amin which chronicles its history despite it often only being known to visitors as a tourist spot. Others concentrate on specific time or issues in Singaporean history such as 1950s which “proved to be particularly exciting moments when its future was so uncertain”.
One of the key changes for this year’s award is its introduction of a translation category in response to growing interest for works written by Singapore authors from China and other parts of Asia. This will also allow a wider variety of submissions to be considered for consideration for the Singapore Prize.
Shelly Bryant, who teaches literary studies at Yale-NUS College and divides her time between Shanghai and Singapore, will serve as one of the judges in this year’s competition. Her translation credits include books published by Epigram Books, Giramondo and National Library Board Singapore as well as poetry anthologies edited with Ilya Kaminsky for Alban Lake Books and Celestial Books.
Kishore Mahbubani, former Singapore diplomat and chairperson of this year’s five-member jury panel to administer and establish the Singapore Prize with an anonymous donor in 2014, has described how this year’s inaugural prize winner (Prof John Miksic’s book Singapore and the Silk Road of the Sea: 1300-1800), helped him recognize how history shapes nation identities. NUS historian Kishore Mahbubani hopes that by sharing passion for history through this award more people may join his passion; to find out more information subscribe to our ST Telegram Channel or Facebook, Twitter or Instagram feeds!