This year’s Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award goes to the Tamer Institute for Community Education in Ramallah. They have been working for twenty years to get children and teenagers in Gaza and the West Bank to read.
It was founded to help children read and receive an education when the unrest meant that they couldn’t go to school. They hold writing workshops, and help train librarians and they supply libraries with books. Since the start they have also published over a hundred books, as there were practically no Palestinian children’s books at the time.
They have an annual reading campaign, and some of the teenagers involved also help make a magazine with poetry and other pieces of writing. Some of the children have gone on to write books as adults.
So, a very worthy sounding winner, and however much an individual author may deserve the five million kronor prize money, an organisation like this one can make far better use of it. Prize ceremony with Crown Princess Victoria on June 2nd in Stockholm.
The Occasional Bookwitch 
I was hoping that the award would go to an organization like this one this year (I love authors, too, but this feels right this year). Thanks for the news!
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