4th time lucky for winner of £30k women’s fiction prize
HAVING lost out on three book awards in the past year, Ali Smith wasn’t holding out much hope after being nominated for the Baileys Women’s Prize For Fiction.
So when she found out she had scooped the £30,000 prize for her novel How To Be Both, Ali Smith had to confess she hadn’t even prepared a speech.
The narrative of two halves tells the twin stories of George and Francesco, a 1960s teenager and a young artist in 15th-century Italy.
It is published in two versions – with the same cover – but with the two halves switched. It doesn’t matter in which order they are read.
Accepting the award at London’s Southbank Centre last night, the writer admitted she was totally unprepared, saying: ‘I can’t believe I’m up here. I really am shocked, speechless... This is unbelievable, it’s not even my birthday.’
The book, Miss Smith’s sixth novel, had previously failed to win the Man Booker Prize, the Costa Book Award and the Folio Prize in the last year. Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, chaired the judging panel. She said: ‘Ancient and modern meet and speak to each other in this tender, brilliant and witty novel of grief, love, sexuality and shapeshifting identity.’
Miss Smith, who was appointed CBE in the New Year’s Honours List, was born in Inverness but now lives in Cambridge with her partner of almost 30 years, filmmaker Sarah Wood.
The writer beat the bookies’ favourite Sarah Waters, who has now been shortlisted three times for the award.
The award, previously known as the Orange Prize, is open to all women writing in English.
Previous winners include Zadie Smith for On Beauty and Lionel Shriver for We Need To Talk About Kevin. Last year’s recipient was Eimear McBride for A Girl Is A Half-formed Thing.