“Ragtime” novelist E.L. Doctorow and Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul were among the 14 finalists announced Wednesday for the Man Booker International Prize, given every two years for lifetime achievement by a fiction writer who writes in English or whose work is widely available in English translation.

The list included three Americans -- Doctorow, Joyce Carol Oates and Evan S. Connell, author of the novels “Mr. Bridge” and “Mrs. Bridge.” Naipaul is a native of Trinidad who lives in England.

The prize is worth about $85,000 and the winner will be announced in May.