Orwell Prize 2012 Journalism and Blog longlists announced

A total of 12 journalists and 18 bloggers have been named as contenders for this year's Orwell Prize.

The annual prize offers three awards, for journalism, a blog, and a book that are considered to be closest to George Orwell’s ambition "to make political writing into an art".

One of those announced today as on the longlist is Paul Lewis, special projects editor for the Guardian, with one of his five submissions being his Twitter stream for Saturday, 6 August, when he was reporting the London riots.

Steve Richards from the Independent and Fintan O’Toole, who writes for the Irish Times and openDemocracy, both make it onto the Journalism Prize longlist for a third time. Ten publications are represented.

Organisers say 140 journalists entered submissions for this year's Journalism Prize and 226 bloggers submitted work.

Three of the shortlisted bloggers from the 2010 Blog Prize - Tim Marshall, David Allen Green and Anna Chen – appear on the 2012 longlist.

Columnist Jenni Russell won the 2011 Orwell Prize for Journalism for work published in the Guardian and the Sunday Times.

Shortlists for the 2012 prizes will be announced on the evening of 24 April, with the winners, who will each receive a £3,000 prize, announced at an awards ceremony on 23 May.
 
Director of the Orwell Prize, Jean Seaton, said in a release:
 
"In these uneasy times the Orwell Prize just goes on growing – more books, journalism and blogs have been entered than ever before. It is testimony to the enduring appeal of Orwell’s clear-eyed radicalism".

She added that "the blogs continue to evolve and increase in range".

"As for the press, despite challenges to its finances and its trustworthiness it has had an outstanding year.

"Some huge stories have promoted excellent writing, while journalists have also ploughed quieter furrows brilliantly."

She expressed disappointment that applicants were not from more diverse backgrounds.

"In one respect there has been disappointment, and it is a familiar one: very few ethnic minority journalists entered or were entered for the prize.

"We hope to see this change in coming years but we are conscious that low entry numbers reflect low numbers in the industry itself. British journalism as a whole needs to become diverse."
 
Journalism Prize

The longlisted journalists are:

Camilla Cavendish: the Times
Edward Docx: Prospect Magazine; the Guardian
Daniel Finkelstein: the Times
Amelia Gentleman: the Guardian
Simon Kuper: Financial Times
Paul Lewis: the Guardian: Twitter
Peter Oborne: Daily Telegraph; The Spectator; Channel 4 Dispatches
Fintan O’Toole: the Irish Times; openDemocracy
Steve Richards: the Independent
David James Smith: the Sunday Times
David Usborne: the Independent
Zoe Williams: the Guardian

This year’s judges for the Journalism Prize are Brian Cathcart (journalist, winner of the Orwell Prize for Books 2000 for the Case of Stephen Lawrence, professor of journalism at Kingston University) and Ian Hargreaves (former editor of the Independent, former director of BBC News and Current Affairs, professor of digital economy at Cardiff University).

Blog Prize

The longlisted bloggers are:

Alex Massie: Alex Massie (http://www.spectator.co.uk/alexmassie)
Anna Chen: Madam Miaow Says (http://madammiaow.blogspot.com/)
Bagehot: Bagehot’s Notebook (http://www.economist.com/blogs/bagehot)
Ms Baroque Baroque in Hackney (http://baroqueinhackney.com)
BendyGirl Benefit Scrounging Scum (http://benefitscroungingscum.blogspot.com/)
David Allen Green: Jack of Kent (http://jackofkent.blogspot.com)
Gavin Kelly: Economics and the reality of the ‘squeezed middle’ (http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/gavin-kelly)
John Rentoul: Independent Blogs (http://blogs.independent.co.uk/author/johnrentoul/)
Lisa Ansell: Lisa Ansell (lisaansell.posterous.com)
Pavel Konnolsky: The Konnolsky Files (http://konnolsky.tumblr.com)
Polly Curtis: Reality Check with Polly Curtis (http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/reality-check-with-polly-curtis)
Mick Fealty: Slugger O’Toole (sluggerotoole.com)
Raph Shirley: Another stupid human (http://www.raphshirley.com/blog/)
Rangers Tax-Case Rangers Tax-Case (http://www.rangerstaxcase.com)
Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi (http://rebeccaomonira.wordpress.com)
Tim Marshall Foreign Matters (http://blogs.news.sky.com/foreignmatters)
Toby Young Telegraph Blogs (http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/author/tobyyoung/)
Wiggy Beneath the Wig (http://beneaththewig.com/)

The Blog Prize is being juged by Suzanne Moore (journalist, the Guardian and the Mail on Sunday) and Hopi Sen (blogger, previously shortlisted and longlisted for the Orwell Prize).

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