Booker prepares for American invasion
JILL LAWLESS
The Americans are coming to storm Britain’s literary citadel.
Organisers of the Booker Prize announced last week that from next year authors from around the world will be eligible to win the prestigious fiction award.
Prize trustees said that starting next year, the prize will be open to all novels written in English and published in Britain, regardless of the author’s nationality.
Founded in 1969, the Booker has previously been open only to writers from Britain, Ireland and the 54-nation Commonwealth of former British colonies.
That has not kept the award — officially known as the Man Booker Prize after its sponsor, financial services firm Man Group Plc — from becoming one of the world’s bestknown literary accolades, one that carries both prestige and commercial clout. Winners include V.S. Naipaul, Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan and Hilary Mantel. Jonathan Taylor, chairman of the prize trustees, said the expanded prize ‘‘will recognise, celebrate and embrace authors writing in English, whether from Chicago, Sheffield or Shanghai’’.
‘‘We are embracing the freedom of English in all its vigour, its vitality, its versatility and its glory wherever it may be,’’ he said. ‘‘We are abandoning the constraints of geography and national boundaries.’’ Organisers said they had considered setting up a separate US prize, but rejected the idea for fear of ‘‘jeopardising or diluting’’ the existing award.
Books will continue to be submitted by British publishers and reviewed by a panel of judges.
The changes don’t affect the Man Booker International Prize, a lifetime achievement award handed out every two years and open to writers from around the world.
Among the six finalists for the £50,000 (2.5 million baht) prize this year are several writers with strong US ties, including Jhumpa Lahiri and Ruth Ozeki.
The winner will be announced at a ceremony in London on Oct 15.
The Booker frequently attracts heated debate, and the expansion received mixed reviews from the literary world. Writer and broadcaster Melvin Bragg told the Sunday Times that it would mean ‘‘the Booker will now lose its distinctiveness’’.
But Irish writer John Banville, who won the prize in 2005 for The Sea, told the BBC it was an excellent idea.
‘‘But God help the rest of us,’’ he added, ‘‘because American fiction is very strong indeed.’’