Mandy Haggith, author of The Last Bear, wins the Award.

Left to right: Linda Cracknell, Doubling Back: Ten Paths Trodden in Memory; Louisa Gairn, Ecology of Modern Scottish Literature; Myrtle and Philip Ashmole, The Carrifran Wildwood Story; Michael Russell, Minister for Culture; Mandy Haggith, The Last Bear; Linda Gillard, Star Gazing. Absent: Gregory Norminton, Serious Things.

Michael Russell, Minister for Environment enthuses on the work of Robin Jenkins and the Literary Award launched in Jenkins' memory at the National Library of Scotland on 29th May.

Autumn in the conifer forest.

News Releases

Read all about the progress of the award and its coverage in the press. All releases are available to download in PDF format.

And The Last Bear Wins

27th August 2009

"An air of tense anticipation imbued the Studio Theatre at the Edinburgh International Book Festival as author, journalist and broadcaster Brian Morton welcomed the audience and assured those shortlisted for the Robin Jenkins Award that he would endeavour to make the proceedings as painless as possible for them. Sitting in the reserved seats at the front they smiled valiantly..."
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Shortlist Smiles

The Edinburgh sun shone, the evening shadows lengthened and they smiled and smiled and we hadn't even opened the wine. They just seemed all so pleased for Mandy and their own achievement in the Robin Jenkins Award. John (RJ) would have loved them all.
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Culture Minister to Present Robin Jenkins Award

23rd August 2009

"As those shortlisted for the Robin Jenkins Literary Award, the UK's first environmental book prize, ready themselves for the event, it has been confirmed that Culture Minister Michael Russell will attend and present the award. The award prize of £5,000 is sponsored by Forestry Commission Scotland in commemoration of Jenkins' employment with the Forestry Commission during the Second World War. That experience influenced much of his writing, in particular The Cone Gatherers and So Gaily Sings the Lark. Forestry Commission Scotland recognises that Scotland's landscape and forests continue to be a valuable source of inspiration to many, including the many writers who have entered for the award and those shortlisted, all of whom have the environment, trees and forestry in Scotland as a key theme or setting for their works..."
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Robin Jenkins Literary Award, UK's First Environmental Book Prize, Announces Shortlist

5th August 2009

"The Robin Jenkins Literary Award has announced its shortlist after what the judges describe as 'a detailed and challenging judging process.'

Brian Morton, Chair of the judging panel, said "Robin Jenkins isn't immediately considered to be a nature writer - and certainly didn't consider himself to be such - but the land, whether in Scotland or somewhere more exotic, and the lives lived in it, whether by Scots or others, was central to his imagination. We've read many books and manuscripts written in that spirit. They all do honour to his memory and while any judging process is 'difficult', that old cliché disguises just how pleasurable it has been deciding on a shortlist for the inaugural Robin Jenkins Award..."
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First Environmental Literary Award Launched

28th May 2008

"A major new book award is being launched to celebrate the life and writing of Robin Jenkins, widely regarded as Scotland's greatest writer of the twentieth century. With a £5000 prize for a work of either fiction or non fiction, The Robin Jenkins Literary Award is launched at the National Library of Scotland on Thursday 29th May by Michael Russell, Minister for Environment..."
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Award Reviews

Let's celebrate the stooshie

Published Date: 1st June 2008
By Stuart Kelly, Scotland on Sunday

Although I was mightily heartened to learn of the new Robin Jenkins Award, to reward writing about the Scottish environment, I was more taken by news of the opening of hostilities between Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott and Nobel Laureate Sir V S Naipaul (below). Despite the Browser's porridge complexion, I do have a cousin in the Caribbean who is a former model and arts activist, and therefore know that for years there has been a brooding fury about Naipaul's snooty attitude towards Trinidad and Barbados. So well done, Walcott, for his poem at the Calabash Literary Festival that began: "I have been bitten. I must avoid infection/ Or else I'll be as dead as Naipaul's fiction". Fine though the Jenkins Award is, how about a MacDiarmid award for the best stooshie in Scottish writing? After all, cone-gathering is one thing but we are all far better at grudge-carrying.

Response to Stuart Kelly

By Russell Bruce, 2nd June 2008

Stooshie is a fine word in reference to literary awards and John Robin Jenkins would not have been phased by the notion. MacDiarmid perhaps sometimes enjoyed a stooshie for its own sake. Jenkins was more contemplative with his wry observance of people and places and it is appropriate that a literary award that commemorates him and is this country's first environmental literary book award will welcome entries that may be contentious, controversial, or provocative. A stooshie is a fine thing for a work that deals with the environment to create but it is not an essential criteria.

Details of the award can be found at www.robinjenkinsaward.org

Russell Bruce
Robin Jenkins Literary Award