The Lost Man Booker Prize

This is one of the loveliest ideas I’ve heard about for ages. In 1970 no-one won the Man Booker prize because in 1971 the prize was changed to be awarded not to a book from the previous year, but as it remains today one in that year of publication. And so the whole of 1970′s literature was lost. To the prize anyway. I understand the logic in making it more current – it makes the commercial impact stronger as hype and coverage can be sustained. But how nice to go back and fix it. Even if it is forty years later.

In another nice touch they have chosen a judging panel where all of the judges were born in or around 1970. Here’s the longlist – the shortlist will be announced in March but the winner will be chosen by international online voting:

- Brian Aldiss, The Hand Reared Boy
- H.E.Bates, A Little Of What You Fancy?
- Nina Bawden, The Birds On The Trees
- Melvyn Bragg, A Place In England
- Christy Brown, Down All The Days
- Len Deighton, Bomber
- J.G.Farrell, Troubles
- Elaine Feinstein, The Circle
- Shirley Hazzard, The Bay Of Noon
- Reginald Hill, A Clubbable Woman
- Susan Hill, I’m The King Of The Castle
- Francis King, A Domestic Animal
- Margaret Laurence, The Fire Dwellers
- David Lodge, Out Of The Shelter
- Iris Murdoch, A Fairly Honourable Defeat
- Shiva Naipaul, Fireflies
- Patrick O’Brian, Master and Commander
- Joe Orton, Head To Toe
- Mary Renault, Fire From Heaven
- Ruth Rendell, A Guilty Thing Surprised
- Muriel Spark, The Driver’s Seat
- Patrick White, The Vivisector

I don’t know who I’ll be voting for as I have not read any of them. I may wait until the shortlist is announced before taking on that particular task. I’d like to read the Naipaul and the Murdoch. And actually I’m interested to see Ruth Rendell on there too because I guess my perception of her was that her work is considered commercial fiction and the prize is usually more ‘literary’.