Row as women’s book prize accepts trans authors

THE Women’s Prize for Fiction has come in for fierce criticism after announcing it will accept entries from anyone ‘legally defined’ as a woman.

Organisers of the prestigious award were accused of putting women’s rights last as they extended the award to ‘all women’ in a bid to end discrimination.

Joanna Prior, chairman of the award’s board, said: ‘As a prize which celebrates the voices of women and the experience of being a woman in all its varied forms, we are proud to include as eligible for submission full-length novels written in English by all women.

‘In our terms and conditions, the word “woman” equates to a cis woman, a transgender woman or anyone who is legally defined as a woman or of the female sex.’ Cis or cisgender is a term for those whose gender identity matches their sex assigned at birth, while a transgender woman is assigned as male at birth but identifies as female.

Miss Prior’s statement was heavily criticised, with the LGB Alliance branding the move ‘extremely depressing’ and a ‘backward step’. In a statement, the alliance highlighted the ‘importance of biological sex’, adding: ‘It is extremely depressing that such an important prize for women is now open to any man who declares himself to be a woman.’

The furore comes after calls for JK Rowling to be ‘cancelled’ over her comments on gender identity and the release of her Troubled Blood novel featuring a crossdressing male killer.

She received online death threats after objecting to the phrase ‘people who menstruate’ rather than ‘women’.