The Man Booker Prize for Fiction is also simply called the Man Booker or the Booker Prize and should not be confused with the Man Booker International Prize, distinguished below. The winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize for Fiction will be announced on October 6, 2009 at a dinner at London's Guildhall.
The Man Booker Prize for Fiction Shortlist 2009
The Man Booker is an internationally renowned literary prize worth £50,000 ($83,000) and connected to recognition, significance and increased commercial success. The Man Booker judging panel changes every year and tries to incorporate a literary critic, an academic, a literary editor, a novelist and a major figure. The panel first selects a longlist of twelve books – the Man Booker Dozen – and then a shortlist of six titles.
The 2009 Man Booker Prize shortlist finalists are:
- A. S. Byatt: The Children's Book. Random House, Chatto and Windus
- J. M. Coetzee: Summertime. Random House, Harvill Secker
- Adam Foulds: The Quickening Maze. Random House, Jonathan Cape
- Hilary Mantel: Wolf Hall. HarperCollins, Fourth Estate
- Simon Mawer: The Glass Room. Little, Brown
- Sarah Waters: The Little Stranger. Little, Brown, Virago
Most writers shortlisted this year already have some Man Booker experience: If selected as the winner, this would be South African writer J. M. Coetzee’s third Man Booker Prize. A.S. Byatt would be winning it for the second time; Sarah Waters has been shortlisted twice before and Hilary Mantel has been longlisted once before. Each shortlisted author will receive £2,500 ($4,200) and a hand-bound copy of his or her book.
About the Man Booker Prize
The Man Booker is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original, English-language full-length novel published in that year. Only a citizen of one of the 53 member states of the Commonwealth of Nations or Ireland can become the winner.
U.K. publishers can enter two full-length novels and a list of up to five additional titles, which must submitted by March 31. Not eligible are translations, self-published books or works by deceased authors. The Booker longlist is announced in late July or early August, the shortlist during the first week of September and the winner in the first week of October.
About the Man Booker International Prize
The Man Booker International Prize was established in 2005 to complement the Man Booker Prize in finding literary excellence worldwide. The prize can be won by an author of any country, given that his or her book is available in English. Man Group plc, sponsor of the Man Booker Prize since 2002, has also sponsored the Man Booker International Prize since its launch.
Unlike the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize rewards a writer's literary body of work and his or her influence on writers and readers worldwide. Publishers cannot submit suggestions as the winner is chosen solely at the discretion of the judging panel. The prize is awarded biannually and the winner is usually announced in June and receives £60,000 ($100,000).
For more about the history of the Man Booker Prize and previous prize winners, check the official website. Similar articles about the Nobel Prize for Literature, the PEN Faulkner Award for Fiction and the Strange Book Titles Award may also be of interest.
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