Slightly reshaped Giller Prize to go on, despite boycotts and protests

The shine on CanLit's glitziest night has dulled, at least according to some, amid sustained backlash against the Giller Foundation for maintaining ties with lead sponsor Scotiabank and other funders linked to Israel.

The shine on CanLit's glitziest night has dulled, at least according to some, amid sustained backlash against the Giller Foundation for maintaining ties with lead sponsor Scotiabank and other funders linked to Israel

Monday's Giller Prize gala is set to take a slightly different shape this year after pro-Palestinian protesters interrupted the ceremony last November.

It brought the televised event to a brief halt — not a risk this year as the CBC won't be broadcasting live. Instead, the event will be taped and air hours later.

Neither the Giller Foundation nor the TV network connected the change to the protests when asked, and noted they've made the same move for other awards shows in recent years.

But the demonstration rippled through the world of Canadian literature. The protesters were arrested that night, and soon after hundreds of people signed a letter calling for the charges against them to be dropped, many of them authors with ties to the award.

"There isn't really a way I can rationalize my way out of this if I feel that what's happening is a genocide and I feel that it's wrong," said Thea Lim, a past Giller finalist who signed the letter early on and has continued to align with advocacy group No Arms in the Arts.

It became a question for her of "sway," Lim said. Her lofty position in the CanLit scene — one she still credits in part to the spot of her debut novel "An Ocean of Minutes" on the Giller short list in 2018 — meant she might have some influence on an issue she cared deeply about.