<p>Roth, a Pulitzer Prize winner, was among the 13 finalists, who included Canada-based writer of Indian origin Rohinton Mistry.<br /><br />The Man Booker International Prize, which honors a writer's body of work, is distinct from the annual Man Booker Prize for fiction, which is awarded for a single book.<br /><br />Roth's body of work spans nearly half-a-century. The 78-year-old writer had earlier won the National Book Award, a statement by the Man Booker International Prize said.<br /><br />For more than 50 years, Roth's books have stimulated, provoked and amused an enormous and still expanding audience, Rick Gekoski, the chair of the judging panel, said.<br /><br />"His career is remarkable in that he starts at such a high level, and keeps getting better. In his 50s and 60s, when most novelists are in decline, he wrote a string of novels of the highest, enduring quality," Gekoski said.<br /><br />Roth, in a video message, said he was honoured.<br /><br />He said one of the particular pleasures he has had as a writer was to have his work read internationally despite all the "heartaches of translations that it entails". <br /><br />In 1969, he became a celebrity with "Portnoy's Complaint", the humorous and sexually explicit acount of a "lust-ridden, mother-addicted Jewish bachelor".<br /><br />He received a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel "American Pastoral".</p>
<p>Roth, a Pulitzer Prize winner, was among the 13 finalists, who included Canada-based writer of Indian origin Rohinton Mistry.<br /><br />The Man Booker International Prize, which honors a writer's body of work, is distinct from the annual Man Booker Prize for fiction, which is awarded for a single book.<br /><br />Roth's body of work spans nearly half-a-century. The 78-year-old writer had earlier won the National Book Award, a statement by the Man Booker International Prize said.<br /><br />For more than 50 years, Roth's books have stimulated, provoked and amused an enormous and still expanding audience, Rick Gekoski, the chair of the judging panel, said.<br /><br />"His career is remarkable in that he starts at such a high level, and keeps getting better. In his 50s and 60s, when most novelists are in decline, he wrote a string of novels of the highest, enduring quality," Gekoski said.<br /><br />Roth, in a video message, said he was honoured.<br /><br />He said one of the particular pleasures he has had as a writer was to have his work read internationally despite all the "heartaches of translations that it entails". <br /><br />In 1969, he became a celebrity with "Portnoy's Complaint", the humorous and sexually explicit acount of a "lust-ridden, mother-addicted Jewish bachelor".<br /><br />He received a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel "American Pastoral".</p>