Literary awards

Encyclopedia Brittanica and http://literaryawards.vertebratesilence.com/ list:

Per Petterson wins International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award
Man Booker International
Orange Prize For Fiction
Commonwealth Writers’ Prize
Oe award
Kiriyama Prize for Fiction
Akutagawa Prize (japan's most prestigious)

Add to this the Nobel Prize for literature, the Pulitzer, and the Goncourt [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prix_Goncourt ] and you have a pretty good selection.

Also, the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works [ http://www.unesco.org/culture/lit/rep/index.php ]