A group of 12 winning tickets shared the $39.8 million jackpot on Oct 2 in Singapore Pools’ TOTO game. The prize money was split among the winners at a rate of $127,391 per share. The winning numbers were picked from the pool of bets placed at Giant supermarket in Pioneer Mall and FairPrice in The Woodleigh Mall, along with Singapore Pools outlets at Pioneer MRT Station, The Starling Shopping Centre, and Chinatown Point.
It’s the first time that the TOTO game has spawned such a large jackpot. The game was launched in 1968 with a simple format of picking one out of 49 numbers, and the prize amounts were calculated from the number of tickets sold. It became a popular choice for many locals because of its affordability and convenience. It was later revamped in 1981 with the snowballing feature, and a System Entry option was introduced the following year.
The Harvard Prize Book is given by the Harvard Club of Singapore to pre-tertiary students who demonstrate a deep care for others in their community. Its aim is to inspire the next generation of leaders, while fostering a sense of belonging among the Harvard family in Singapore. The prize is a recognition of the importance of caring for others, and it’s also a way to connect students to the global Harvard community.
For the first time since the award’s launch, five writers were shortlisted in two or more categories. Clara Chow, for example, made history by being the first to be shortlisted in both the English fiction and English creative nonfiction categories. She’s joined by the directors of this year’s Singapore Writers Festival, Yeow Kai Chai and Pooja Nansi, and by Mok Zining, whose debut work is competing in the Chinese poetry category. All but one of the writers in the English creative nonfiction category were shortlisted for their first books, including Wang Gungwu and Suratman Markasan, both 91, who are the oldest people ever to have been shortlisted in the program’s history.
NUS historian Timothy P. Barnard’s Imperial Creatures (2019, available here) explores the interaction between humans and animals in colonial Singapore. This is his first book to make the shortlist for a major literary prize, and it follows his 2018 win of the NUS History Prize for Singapore And The Silk Road Of The Sea, 1300-1800. The panel that judges the prize is chaired by NUS Asia Research Institute distinguished fellow Kishore Mahbubani. The winner will be announced on October 29. NUS’s website has more information on the prize and its categories here. This is Publishing Perspectives’ 131st awards-related report in the 137 days since our launch on January 3. More coverage of books and publishing from around the world can be found here, as well as more on Singapore here. The complete list of shortlisted authors and works, categorized by language, can be found here. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook for daily updates from the world of publishing.