WINNIPEG, MB – Two University of Winnipeg faculty members and authors each took home a prize at the Manitoba Book Awards on Sunday, April 25, held at culturel franco-manitobain and hosted by UWinnipeg’s Neil Besner, Vice President (Students and International) and former Dean of Arts.
The Winner’s
UWinnipeg’s history professor emeritus, Robert J. Young earned the Alexander Kennedy Isbister Award for Non-Fiction for his book An American by Degrees: The Extraordinary Lives of Jules Jusserand, and English professor Debra Schnitzer earned the Margaret Laurence Award for Fiction for her novel an unexpected break in the weather.
“It was very gratifying to see Deborah Schnitzer and Robert Young win significant awards at the event,” said Besner. “Deborah won for a fine novel, and Bob for a major scholarly work. It was also an honour for other well-known UWinnipeg authors like scholar Roy Loewen and celebrated writer Margaret Sweatman to be nominated for awards. The University of Winnipeg should take great satisfaction in the recognition its writers garner annually at this event; this year was no exception.”
Margaret Sweatman’s The Players was short-listed for the McNally Book of the Year and Royden Loewen’s Immigrants in Prairie Cities: Ethnic Diversity in Twentieth-Century Canadawas short-listed for the Alexander Kennedy Isbister Awards for Non-Fiction.
Robert J. Young
Young is Professor Emeritus of History at the UWinnipeg. He specializes in 20th century European international politics. He is a graduate of the University of Saskatchewan and the London School of Economics. Young’s doctoral dissertation was written under the supervision of Donald Watt. It was published by Harvard University Press as In Command of France: French Foreign Policy and Military Planning, 1933-1940. Over the last forty years, Young, has written numerous academic books and articles including France and the Origins of the Second World War and Louis Barthou: Power and Pleasure.
Debra Schnitzer
She completed her PhD at the University of Manitoba exploring inter-arts correspondences between visual and verbal systems of representation in Modernist visual art and narratives. She currently teaches English Literature at The University of Winnipeg and specializes in Modernist literature, most particularly in the writing of Virginia Woolf and Gertrude Stein. She has developed courses in gay and lesbian literatures, Aboriginal literatures, peace and war making in literature, picture books for children as well as Practicum courses that explore literacy and culture, community-based learning and activism.
The Manitoba Writers’ Guild
The Manitoba Writers’ Guild formed in 1981 to promote writing throughout Manitoba, and remains committed to providing personal and professional support to writers at any level in their careers,and enhancing the province’s literary community. The Association of Manitoba Book Publishers represents 14 Manitoban publishing houses, which publish over 100 books each year in English, French, and Cree. Many of these books are written by Manitoban authors or feature Manitoban stories.
