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The Booker Prize
or Booker Prize (UK) ; or The Booker Prize for Fiction ; or The Man Booker Prize
Subcategory of Awards International Awards
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History

The Booker Prize was established in 1969, and is awarded to a novel written in the English language and published in the United Kingdom. The writer normally needs to be from a country within the Commonwealth.

It has previously been known as the Booker-McConnell Prize (1969-2011) and the Man Booker Prize (2002-2019).

The Booker Prize is complemented by The International Booker Prize.

Notes

  • Established by Booker plc in 1968, the prize name was chaged in 2002 to 'Man Booker Prize' to coincide with the sponsorship provided by the Man investment group. The prize aims "to reward the best novel of the year written by a citizen of the Commonwealth or Republic of Ireland".

Latest Winners / Recipients (also see subcategories)v2199

Year: 2014

winner y separately published work icon The Narrow Road to the Deep North Richard Flanagan , Sydney : Random House , 2013 Z1928536 2013 single work novel historical fiction (taught in 5 units)

'A novel of the cruelty of war, and tenuousness of life and the impossibility of love.

'August, 1943. In the despair of a Japanese POW camp on the Thai-Burma death railway, Australian surgeon Dorrigo Evans is haunted by his love affair with his uncle's young wife two years earlier. Struggling to save the men under his command from starvation, from cholera, from beatings, he receives a letter that will change his life forever.

'This savagely beautiful novel is a story about the many forms of love and death, of war and truth, as one man comes of age, prospers, only to discover all that he has lost.' (Publisher's blurb)

Year: 2008

winner y separately published work icon The White Tiger Aravind Adiga , London : Atlantic Books , 2008 Z1521556 2008 single work novel (taught in 2 units) 'Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher. Entrepreneur. Murderer. Over the course of seven nights, by the scattered light of a preposterous chandelier, Balram tells the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life -- having nothing but his own wits to help him along.' (Publisher's blurb)

Year: 2003

winner y separately published work icon Vernon God Little : A 21st Century Comedy in the Presence of Death D. B. C. Pierre , London : Faber , 2003 Z1067461 2003 single work novel humour

Year: 2001

winner y separately published work icon True History of the Kelly Gang Peter Carey , St Lucia : University of Queensland Press , 2000 Z668312 2000 single work novel historical fiction (taught in 29 units)

'"I lost my own father at 12 yr. of age and know what it is to be raised on lies and silences my dear daughter you are presently too young to understand a word I write but this history is for you and will contain no single lie may I burn in Hell if I speak false."

'In TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG, the legendary Ned Kelly speaks for himself, scribbling his narrative on errant scraps of paper in semi-literate but magically descriptive prose as he flees from the police. To his pursuers, Kelly is nothing but a monstrous criminal, a thief and a murderer. To his own people, the lowly class of ordinary Australians, the bushranger is a hero, defying the authority of the English to direct their lives. Indentured by his bootlegger mother to a famous horse thief (who was also her lover), Ned saw his first prison cell at 15 and by the age of 26 had become the most wanted man in the wild colony of Victoria, taking over whole towns and defying the law until he was finally captured and hanged. Here is a classic outlaw tale, made alive by the skill of a great novelist.' (From the publisher's website.)

Year: 1999

winner y separately published work icon Disgrace J. M. Coetzee , London : Secker and Warburg , 1999 6173241 1999 single work novel (taught in 11 units)

After years teaching Romantic poetry at the Technical University of Cape Town, David Lurie, middle-aged and twice divorced, has an impulsive affair with a student. The affair sours; he is denounced and summoned before a committee of inquiry. Willing to admit his guilt, but refusing to yield to pressure to repent publicly, he resigns and retreats to his daughter Lucy's isolated smallholding. For a time, his daughter's influence and the natural rhythms of the farm promise to harmonise his discordant life. But the balance of power in the country is shifting. He and Lucy become victims of a savage and disturbing attack which brings into relief all the faultlines in their relationship.' (Publisher's blurb)

Works About this Award

The Booker Prize 2021 Shortlist : A Reading Guide Kate Evans , Claire Nichols , Sarah L'Estrange , 2021 single work column
— Appears in: ABC News [Online] , October 2021;
'When this year's Booker Prize shortlist was announced, our first thought was, "Where are the Brits?"'
Booker Prize Shortlist 2021 : British-Somali Author Nadifa Mohamed Makes History, Americans Dominate Dee Jefferson , 2021 single work column
— Appears in: ABC News [Online] , September 2021;
'Just one British author has made the shortlist for the UK's prestigious Booker Prize, announced on Tuesday afternoon (London time) in a live-streamed ceremony.' (Introduction)
Eligibility, Access and the Laws of Literary Prizes Alexandra Dane , 2020 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Humanities Review , May no. 66 2020;

'The ability of literary prizes to sway literary tastes and shape cultural discourse has long been explored through the decisions made by the prize judging panel. The jury of experts, who bring with them symbolic capital and are often regarded as representing a nation’s sophisticated literary palate, have been the subject of extensive scholarship. However, there is a selection process that occurs prior to the commencement of the official or public adjudication. The entry guidelines for individual literary prizes ensure that particular authors and titles will not, or cannot, be considered for the prize and are, therefore, excluded from the symbolic and economic rewards that come with being shortlisted for and winning a literary prize. How do literary prize eligibility requirements limit access to the prestige and promotion that comes with a literary prize? How does the issue of exclusivity influence the ways prizes run, the winners that are chosen and, ultimately, the field-wide conceptions of prize-winning writing?' (Introduction)

Australian Author Shokoofeh Azar Shortlisted for International Booker Prize with Novel Inspired by Iranian History and Folklore Claire Nichols , 2020 single work column
— Appears in: ABC News [Online] , April 2020;

'In 2011 the writer Shokoofeh Azar found herself in a strange country, with a strange dilemma.' 

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