It’s that time of the year again, and the Booker Prize (formerly known as the Man Booker Prize) longlist has been announced! Also known as the Booker Dozen (ironically as there are 13 books on the nomination list), this year’s nomination list seems unlikely to follow last year’s trend of diversity as the list includes many big names.
- Margaret Atwood – The Testaments
- Kevin Barry – Night Boat to Tangier
- Oyinkan Braithwaite – My Sister, The Serial Killer
- Lucy Ellmann – Ducks, Newburyport
- Bernardine Evaristo – Girl, Woman, Other
- John Lanchester – The Wall
- Deborah Levy – The Man Who Saw Everything
- Valeria Luiselli – Lost Children Archive
- Chigozie Obioma – An Orchestra of Minorities
- Max Porter – Lanny
- Salman Rushdie – Quichotte
- Elif Shafak –10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World
- Jeanette Winterson – Frankissstein
The most notable inclusions on the list are previous winners Margaret Atwood and Salman Rushdie. Atwood’s novel is the much anticipated sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale that has seen so much popularity due to the release of the TV show of the same name. Rushdie, who previously won for what is possibly his seminal novel Midnight’s Children, finds himself on the list once again by delving into a retelling of Don Quixote. The fact that the nominations are for books yet to be published raises the question of elitism in the judging process of the award. But there is no doubt that these names, and these titles, are highly anticipated.
However, these are not the only big names, as there are quite a few returning nominees in this year’s list. In last year’s post on the 2018 longlist I wrote:
The Man Booker Prize likes to consider itself as the “leading prize for quality fiction in English.” Considering just how western-centric the prize has historically been, not to mention the rather sordid legacy of colonial and imperial subjugation of the originally Commonwealth citizenship requirement of the prize, it seems to me that this self-inflation of being the ‘leading prize’ is somewhat far fetched and misleading.
Rather, and this just might be my opinion, it seems that the Prize is attempting to assert a level of literary authority that is given credence by the longevity of the Prize, but aside from that, not very much else attests to the prominence given to the Prize.
The presence of these return nominees poses the question of who controls the extent of the literary sphere. There is no denying the writing skills of those returnees. indeed, Jeanette Winterson, for example, is a long time favourite author of mine.
Food for thought: On the one hand, a jump to previous nominees and winners can sometimes react in an automatic reaction of assuming literary excellence. On the other hand, debut authors, and more creative novels, do not always serve to demonstrate a wide-spread confidence for the award. My opinion on the eminence of the prize and the literature that achieves was not improved as I was unable to even finish last year’s winner, Milkman, the debut novel by Burns, which was a common critique that I have heard from others as well.
However, while this year’s list does not feature any graphic novels or thrillers, there are numerous things about the list that I am excited for. Particularly, one of the most intriguing developments for the longlist is that eight out of the thirteen nominations are written by women. While last year’s winner was also a woman, Anna Burns, the inclusion of so many female nominees is a huge indication of the literary scene. It is the first year that the longlist has been so dominated by women, and yet, not all of the stories are so dominated by female narratives. Winterson’s novel, Frankissstein, provides the much needed representation in literature of transexuals. Aside from the big names and the much anticipated storylines coming from them, there are a notable few that have caught the critics’ attention. For example, the 1,000 page long sentence that comprises the entire of Lucy Ellman’s novel Ducks, Newburyport definitely stands out as one of the more creative entries on the list.
The short list will be released September 3rd, 2019, so we have a little over a month to get started on the books and make our predictions on which books are going to go through to the next round!
For a short summary of some of the nominations, be sure to check this article from the Guardian.
