2005 The Sea by John Banville2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst2003 Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan1997 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy1996 Last Orders by Graham Swift1995 The Ghost Road by Pat Barker1994 How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle 1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1992 Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth (co-winner)1991 The Famished Road by Ben Okri 1990 Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt 1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1988 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey 1987 Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively 1986 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis 1985 The Bone People by Keri Hulme 1984 Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner 1983 Life & Times of Michael K by J. M. Coetzee 1982 Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally 1981 Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie 1980 Rites of Passage by William Golding 1979 Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald 1978 The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch 1977 Staying on by Paul Scott 1976 Saville by David Storey 1975 Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala 1974 The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer 1973 The Siege of Krishnapur by J. G. Farrell 1972 G. by John Berger 1971 In a Free State by V. S. Naipaul 1970 The Elected Member by Bernice. Rubens 1969 Something to Answer For by P. H. Newby
OK, I don't score too highly, clocking up only seven: 2003, 2000, 1999, 1992, 1990, 1989, 1988. Of those, there were some I didn't even think were very good. Vernon God Little I thought was terrible. I also tried with God Of Small Things and Midnight's Children, but I didn't reach the finishing post. Both Disgrace and Remains Of The Day I thought were great, those two would be my highlights.
All in all, I don't think that Booker list looks very representative of the best of British and Commonwealth literature of the past 35 years. Too many of them are well-known novelists with second-rate novels (both McEwen and Kingsley Amis wrote far better novels than the ones that won them the Booker, for instance. Similarly, I liked Banville's The Book Of Evidence, but flicking through The Sea, it looks like a portentous slog.) Also, there's nothing "genre" on there. No crime fiction, thrillers etc. Surely the likes of Le Carré or Rankin are as good as or better than some of these fairly second-rate "literary" novels that have won the prize. (I do admit that I haven't even heard of some of the early winners.)
― Revivalist (Revivalist), Friday, 8 September 2006 13:26 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jordan (Jordan), Friday, 8 September 2006 13:35 (seventeen years ago) link
Funny, there was a question on Mastermind[?] the other night about the 2005 prize and I had already forgotten the author's name.
― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 8 September 2006 13:40 (seventeen years ago) link
― Josh (Josh), Friday, 8 September 2006 13:42 (seventeen years ago) link
― Why does my IQ changes? (noodle vague), Friday, 8 September 2006 14:05 (seventeen years ago) link
I wouldn't say they're the best books of each year, but they're nearly always worth reading. Exceptions - Life of Pi and The Bone People were both weak, and Vernon God Little, which I thought was unreadable.
― Ray (Ray), Friday, 8 September 2006 14:06 (seventeen years ago) link
― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 8 September 2006 14:10 (seventeen years ago) link
3.5, all post 1993, incidentally.
― ledge (ledge), Friday, 8 September 2006 14:54 (seventeen years ago) link
If the selection committee's tastes clash too vigorously with those of the reading public at large, then the prize will be ignored, become irrelevant and cease to serve its function. If the prize merely serves to ratify what the public has already voted for with their money, then it becomes equally irrelevant. The sweet spot is to choose a book that is just a bit 'above' the tastes of the majority, sold respectably but not spectacularly, and was well-reviewed.
BTW, I've read one of the prize-winners listed above, the Arundhati Roy book. It was (how to put this?) a perfect representative of everything prize-worthy in a novel and it didn't entirely suck. Not entirely.
― Aimless (Aimless), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:14 (seventeen years ago) link
So, 6 read. I've got True History of the Kelly Gang, Disgrace, The Sea, The Sea, and The Sea in the to-read pile. None acquired specifically for being Booker.
― Jaq (Jaq), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:16 (seventeen years ago) link
― Revivalist (Revivalist), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:18 (seventeen years ago) link
― Cherish (Cherish), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:33 (seventeen years ago) link
― Why does my IQ changes? (noodle vague), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:52 (seventeen years ago) link
I guess 2.5, since The English Patient was merely a co-winner. In any event, I care very little for any of these three.
― c('°c) (Leee), Friday, 8 September 2006 15:56 (seventeen years ago) link
― Haikunym (Haikunym), Friday, 8 September 2006 17:09 (seventeen years ago) link
― Sara R-C (Sara R-C), Friday, 8 September 2006 19:35 (seventeen years ago) link
2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst2003 Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1988 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey
of these "The Line Of Beauty" is probably the best. "Vernon God Little" is not only the worst on this list but far and away the worst book i've ever finished!
― jed_ (jed), Friday, 8 September 2006 19:52 (seventeen years ago) link
― anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 9 September 2006 01:51 (seventeen years ago) link
― anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 9 September 2006 02:09 (seventeen years ago) link
for the record, starting from '69, i've read 5 national book award/fiction (gaddis x2, pynchon, delillo & franzen [which seems a horribly predictable series]) and 2 pulitzer/fiction (toole, chabon) winners.
― andrew s (andrew s), Saturday, 9 September 2006 03:11 (seventeen years ago) link
Just 6.
― Fred (Fred), Saturday, 9 September 2006 03:14 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ray (Ray), Saturday, 9 September 2006 06:28 (seventeen years ago) link
i haven't read "the ghost road," but "regeneration" (about siegfried sassoon and wilfred owen) is terrific.
― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Saturday, 9 September 2006 07:05 (seventeen years ago) link
Non Fiction (6)William L. Shirer The Rise and Fall of the Third ReichGore Vidal United States: Essays 1952-1992Tina Rosenberg The Haunted Land: Facing Europe's Ghosts After CommunismEdward Ball Slaves in the FamilyAndrew Solomon The Noonday Demon: An Anatomy of DepressionJoan Didion The Year of Magical Thinking
Poetry: (6)William Carlos Williams Paterson: Book III and Selected PoemsArchibald MacLeish Collected Poems, 1917-1952Robert Lowell Life StudiesRandall Jarrell The Woman at the Washington ZooFrank O'Hara The Collected Works of Frank O'HaraLucille Clifton Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems 1988-2000
Pulitzer (10)The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest HemingwayThe Confessions of Nat Turner by William StyronThe Executioner's Song by Norman MailerA Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy TooleBeloved by Toni MorrisonThe Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar HijuelosA Thousand Acres by Jane SmileyAmerican Pastoral by Philip RothMiddlesex by Jeffrey EugenidesGilead by Marilynne Robinson
― anthony easton (anthony), Saturday, 9 September 2006 07:32 (seventeen years ago) link
Sitting on a shelf, somewhere in the chaos that is my apartment, waiting to be read:2005 The Sea by John Banville2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle 1984 Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner 1979 Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald 1974 The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer (7)
― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Saturday, 9 September 2006 07:59 (seventeen years ago) link
― SRH (Skrik), Saturday, 9 September 2006 09:14 (seventeen years ago) link
Anyhoo, I've read the Coetzee books and just a few other things. Is _Paddy Clark..._ worth it? I read a few of Doyle's books a few years back. I borrowed this one from the library, but when I got home, I took two glances at it and wondered why the hell I'd picked up another Roddy Doyle book. Back in the back it went.
I am looking forward to reading _The Sea_ though.Interesting that _Amsterdam_ is on there, as I had the impression that everyone considers it to be one of Mewanc's weakest novels.
― Øystein (Øystein), Saturday, 9 September 2006 11:22 (seventeen years ago) link
― jed_ (jed), Saturday, 9 September 2006 12:10 (seventeen years ago) link
― sandy mc (sandy mc), Saturday, 9 September 2006 12:34 (seventeen years ago) link
― jaymc (jaymc), Saturday, 9 September 2006 14:04 (seventeen years ago) link
I am never gonna watch the movie tho.
― Why does my IQ changes? (noodle vague), Sunday, 10 September 2006 09:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― Why does my IQ changes? (noodle vague), Sunday, 10 September 2006 09:17 (seventeen years ago) link
8 is my total.
― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Sunday, 10 September 2006 17:54 (seventeen years ago) link
2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan1996 Last Orders by Graham Swift1990 Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt
And I saw three of the movies based on books of this list:
1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro1982 Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally
In retrospective I liked those movies better than the books. Which seems a bit strange.
― Ionica (Ionica), Monday, 11 September 2006 08:05 (seventeen years ago) link
― Matt (Matt), Monday, 11 September 2006 10:28 (seventeen years ago) link
― frankiemachine (frankiemachine), Tuesday, 12 September 2006 16:48 (seventeen years ago) link
― derrick (derrick), Saturday, 16 September 2006 08:08 (seventeen years ago) link
― Casuistry (Chris P), Saturday, 16 September 2006 16:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 19 September 2006 17:01 (seventeen years ago) link
― Casuistry (Chris P), Thursday, 21 September 2006 06:20 (seventeen years ago) link
so did anyone read the 2008 winner : Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger?
― Zeno, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 09:55 (fifteen years ago) link
Zero. However I'd be interested in reading 'Midnight's Children' after catching a repeat of the Arena doc on the book. Maybe Ishiguro and Barker at some point.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 10:09 (fifteen years ago) link
AUSSSIEAUSSIE
― wilter, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 10:10 (fifteen years ago) link
What a shitty looking prize:
http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2008/10/15/adiga300x230.jpg
― Doghouse O RLY (G00blar), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 10:15 (fifteen years ago) link
as long as the $$$ looks nice..
― Zeno, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 10:51 (fifteen years ago) link
Six:2004 The Line of Beauty - just read this, it's fantastic. Enormously recommended2002 Life of Pi - throwaway, really, but nice enough. Points off for (I suspect) being a book that's really about storytelling1999 Disgrace - aye, great. It must've been a cliffhanger, I remember finishing it while walking through Westminster tube station as I needed to get somewhere and I couldn't wait to find out what happened. That said, I can't remember much about it now1998 Amsterdam - shockingly bad. Pointless, no-one in it you'd care about. The praise lavished on McEwan, while occasionally deserved and he's undeniably a great prosewriter, is going to look silly in future. Basically doesn't have much to say1994 How Late It Was, How Late - fine, a bit bleak really, but a nice thing to win a prize like this1992 The English Patient - excellent, a great read, full of interesting little details and memorable scenes, like Captain Corelli's Mandolin (though it doesn't seem to have won many prizes)
(I own eight of the others, to my shame)
― Ismael Klata, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 17:45 (fifteen years ago) link
i have read 14 but like five were because of a contemp brit fiction class i took and one other, the hollinghurst, i won as a prize in that class for a seminar i gave. the nadine gordimer novel is quite beautiful maybe my fav from that list.
i thought in the skin of the lion had won?? love that book >>> english patient.
― ******* (Lamp), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 19:49 (fifteen years ago) link
1998 Amsterdam - shockingly bad. Pointless, no-one in it you'd care about. The praise lavished on McEwan, while occasionally deserved and he's undeniably a great prosewriter, is going to look silly in future. Basically doesn't have much to say
Sooooooooooooooo otm
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 19:50 (fifteen years ago) link
Columbia College Class of 1997 (and Salutatorian)
― gabbneb, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 19:56 (fifteen years ago) link
were u friends?
― ******* (Lamp), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 19:56 (fifteen years ago) link
2005 The Sea by John Banville2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1990 Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt
― Michael White, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 20:12 (fifteen years ago) link
2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle
― metametadata (n/a), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 20:14 (fifteen years ago) link
2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1981 Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie 1978 The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 20:19 (fifteen years ago) link
never heard of him
― gabbneb, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 20:20 (fifteen years ago) link
2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1981 Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie
― Doghouse O RLY (G00blar), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 20:21 (fifteen years ago) link
2005 The Sea by John Banville - loved it2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst - loved it, and was really disappointed when I went on to read 'The Swimming-Pool Library'2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey - loved it, this and Oscar and Lucinda are Carey's only really great books1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee - broke my heart1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan - really dig McEwan, but this is his worst book, a bit of black fluff1996 Last Orders by Graham Swift - didn't see what all the fuss was about1994 How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman - enjoyed it1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle - OK, but didn't really see what all the fuss was about1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro - loved it1988 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey - see above1987 Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively - it was OK, I guess1986 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis - everything after 'Lucky Jim' has been a bit of a disappointment for me1984 Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner - dull dull dull1983 Life & Times of Michael K by J. M. Coetzee - liked it1980 Rites of Passage by William Golding - enjoyed it, though it seemed strangely old-fashioned1979 Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald - Fitzgerald is the bee's knees
― James Morrison, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 22:31 (fifteen years ago) link
all my friends loved the bone people so much in the 80's. there is a serious cult for that book.
― scott seward, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 22:32 (fifteen years ago) link
Here's the updated list with the three most recent ones added:
2008 The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga2007 The Gathering by Anne Enright2006 The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai2005 The Sea by John Banville2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst2003 Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan1997 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy1996 Last Orders by Graham Swift1995 The Ghost Road by Pat Barker1994 How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1992 Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth (co-winner)1991 The Famished Road by Ben Okri1990 Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro1988 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey1987 Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively1986 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis1985 The Bone People by Keri Hulme1984 Hotel Du Lac by Anita Brookner1983 Life & Times of Michael K by J. M. Coetzee1982 Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally1981 Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie1980 Rites of Passage by William Golding1979 Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald1978 The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch1977 Staying on by Paul Scott1976 Saville by David Storey1975 Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala1974 The Conservationist by Gordimer1973 The Siege of Krishnapur by J. G. Farrell1972 G. by John Berger1971 In a Free State by V. S. Naipaul1970 The Elected Member by Bernice. Rubens1969 Something to Answer For by P. H. Newby
--
I think I've read 12, though several of those were so long ago that I can hardly remember if I genuinely have even read them, let alone what they were like, especially as I was too young to really be able to appreciate them. My Dad used to follow the prize quite closely and would buy and read the winner every year, along with a selection of the shortlist that took his fancy, and had a small archive folder of newspaper cuttings about it over the years.
― krakow, Thursday, 16 October 2008 06:58 (fifteen years ago) link
My personal favourite of those I know is Kazuo Ishiguro's "The Remains of the Day", by quite a way. A wonderful book.
― krakow, Thursday, 16 October 2008 07:00 (fifteen years ago) link
One, The Bone People, and I didn't much care for it. Only other I'm likely ever to read is How Late it Was..., I love James Kelman, but mostly the Booker just doesn't like what I do. I've read maybe a hundred shortlisted ones, tho.
― Niles Caulder, Thursday, 16 October 2008 07:25 (fifteen years ago) link
Here's my list. All of them, except possibly The God of Small Things, were worthwhile, and I really loved Last Orders and Remains of the Day.
2005 The Sea by John Banville2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1997 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy1996 Last Orders by Graham Swift1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1985 The Bone People by Keri Hulme 1983 Life & Times of Michael K by J. M. Coetzee
― franny glass, Thursday, 16 October 2008 19:57 (fifteen years ago) link
Arghh, I forgot that "How Late It Was, How Late" was on there. I think I prefer that to even "Remains Of The Day" actually. Disregard what I said above.
― krakow, Thursday, 16 October 2008 21:10 (fifteen years ago) link
I have still not read any of these books.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Saturday, 25 October 2008 17:15 (fifteen years ago) link
same here. I'm guessing my first will probably be Midnight's Children (Satanic Verses was great and I'm sort of getting the Rushdie itch again) or The Famished Road (been meaning to read this for a while now; didn't even realize it was a Booker winner)
― The droid army of the legacy press (bernard snowy), Sunday, 26 October 2008 01:31 (fifteen years ago) link
six
1998 Amsterdam: A Novel by Ian McEwan1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro1986 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis1981 Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie1971 In a Free State by V. S. Naipaul
― m coleman, Sunday, 26 October 2008 11:47 (fifteen years ago) link
3: Rites Of Passage, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, Vernon God Little
― 100 tons of hardrofl beyond zings (Just got offed), Sunday, 26 October 2008 11:50 (fifteen years ago) link
Just one, sadly. Possession.
― ○◙i shine cuz i genital grind◙○ (roxymuzak), Sunday, 26 October 2008 16:45 (fifteen years ago) link
Does The Sea, not The Sea, the Sea, have any of Banville's trademark descriptions of the sky?
― alimosina, Sunday, 26 October 2008 23:57 (fifteen years ago) link
2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1997 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje
All three very depressing books, particularly The God of Small Things.
― tron, Monday, 27 October 2008 04:20 (fifteen years ago) link
I've only read this one:2001 True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey
― o. nate, Tuesday, 28 October 2008 21:13 (fifteen years ago) link
I have read zero of them.
― rubisco (Abbott), Saturday, 1 November 2008 21:59 (fifteen years ago) link
So, Hilary Mante..is she really that good?
― nostormo, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 08:38 (eleven years ago) link
Mantel
― nostormo, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 08:39 (eleven years ago) link
4, ranked (though I enjoyed each of them): The Seige of Krishnapur > Wolf Hall > How late it was, how late > Oscar & Lucinda.Aborted reads: The God of Small Things, Life of Pi.In the queue: The Remains Of the Day.
― calumerio, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 10:10 (eleven years ago) link
xp mantel chat: itt WOLF HALL the book by hilary mantel and the upcoming hbo/bbc miniseries based on the same
― ledge, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 10:12 (eleven years ago) link
2003 Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre1997 The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle 1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)
I have 'Life Of Pi' but I havent read it yet
― Michael B Higgins (Michael B), Wednesday, 17 October 2012 20:41 (eleven years ago) link
Two that I recognize and recall, possibly a third one since forgotten. Even with the two I know I read, I was unaware they had any connection to the prize.
― Aimless, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 21:00 (eleven years ago) link
reread 'remains of the day' recently, just about a perfect novel.
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Wednesday, 17 October 2012 21:44 (eleven years ago) link
I've added only one from the original list to my 6 posted in 2006: True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey
Here's the newest entries:
2012 Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel2011 The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes2010 The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson2009 Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel2008 The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga2007 The Gathering by Anne Enright2006 The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
I've read 3 of these: both Hilary Mantel's and The Finkler Question.
― Jaq, Thursday, 18 October 2012 03:33 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/23/arundhati-roy-interview-goddess-of-big-ideas
― xyzzzz__, Sunday, 23 November 2014 18:07 (nine years ago) link
She has recently caused a stir for downplaying another widely admired figure, Malala Yousafzai. After she gave a TV interview in which she suggested Malala was a pawn in game of global politics, the Pakistan writer Pervez Hoodbhoy wrote an article asking why it was that Malala bothered many on the left, citing Roy as an example.“I have no doubt she did something wonderful,” she says. “But that was not the point I was trying to make.” She says she wanted to draw attention to the fact that Dalit women are similarly mistreated in India but are never heard about. But that doesn’t make Malala a puppet. She stood up against male oppression. Isn’t that an unambiguously good thing?“I don’t think you can isolate Malala and say ‘Oh this is wonderful.’” Why not? “I don’t think this world of prizes and awards is an innocent world. It is loaded and it’s precious to suggest it’s not.” She thinks Malala’s Nobel peace prize was an extension of the politically corrupt process that awarded one to Obama, whom she characterises as a warmonger, adding, “I’m not trying to take anything away from Malala.”But of course she is.
“I have no doubt she did something wonderful,” she says. “But that was not the point I was trying to make.” She says she wanted to draw attention to the fact that Dalit women are similarly mistreated in India but are never heard about. But that doesn’t make Malala a puppet. She stood up against male oppression. Isn’t that an unambiguously good thing?
“I don’t think you can isolate Malala and say ‘Oh this is wonderful.’” Why not? “I don’t think this world of prizes and awards is an innocent world. It is loaded and it’s precious to suggest it’s not.” She thinks Malala’s Nobel peace prize was an extension of the politically corrupt process that awarded one to Obama, whom she characterises as a warmonger, adding, “I’m not trying to take anything away from Malala.”
But of course she is.
― xyzzzz__, Sunday, 23 November 2014 18:10 (nine years ago) link
Anybody read The Narrow Road To The Deep North? Also considering NBA winner Redeployment, but they're looking pretty grim, Jim, and I'm not exactly lacking that in my reader's digestion. Still...
― dow, Sunday, 23 November 2014 22:45 (nine years ago) link
My flatmate bought all the shortlist in hardback so yes I've read The Narrow Road.... About 1/3 staring unflinching into the abyss of japanese POW death camps, 2/3 a boring novel of relationships, the kind that certain critics periodically love to trumpet the death of.
I'm up to 9.5, maybe I got lucky but would count over half of those as worthwhile - Banville, Hollinghurst, Kelly Gang Carey, the Mantels, Coetzee, will throw a bone to Ishiguro although it's not his best. This year's winner not in that list.
― Kelly Gang Carey and the Mantels (ledge), Monday, 24 November 2014 12:06 (nine years ago) link
six.
― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Monday, 24 November 2014 20:24 (nine years ago) link
Barry Unsworth is a king.
Devastating read: Just after he turned 80, my father asked me to stop communicating with him. Future letters would be returned, unread. “You were always a difficult child,” he wrote. I wept at that. But there was a miserable kind of relief in the finality. https://t.co/p7RKsJBtuq— Martin Doyle (@MartinDoyleIT) October 14, 2020
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 19:29 (three years ago) link
8 and I started the Finkler Question but found it awful
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 19:43 (three years ago) link
thought it was going to be none ended up being 4.amis, farrell, rushdie, golding.
lols bazza u.
― Fizzles, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 19:46 (three years ago) link
annoyingly that's quite a touching, thoughtful piece. there is, for me, not a lot worse than close relationships unreconciled before death. sorry for the buzzkill.
― Fizzles, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 19:49 (three years ago) link
Yeah it was a very good piece on a tough subject.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 19:55 (three years ago) link
Added list from Wikipedia with newest winners, sorry for formatting (phoneposting).1969 P. H. Newby - Something to Answer For1970 Bernice Rubens - The Elected Member1970 J. G. Farrell - Troubles (retrospective)1971 V. S. Naipaul - In a Free State 1972 John Berger - G. 1973 J. G. Farrell -The Siege of Krishnapur 1974 Nadine Gordimer - The Conservationist/Stanley Middleton - Holiday1975 Ruth Prawer Jhabvala - Heat and Dust1976 David Storey - Saville 1977 Paul Scott - Staying On1978 Iris Murdoch - The Sea, the Sea 1979 Penelope Fitzgerald - Offshore1980 William Golding - Rites of Passage1981 Salman Rushdie - Midnight's Children1982 Thomas Keneally - Schindler's Ark1983 J. M Coetzee - Life & Times of Michael K1984 Anita Brookner - Hotel du Lac 1985 Keri Hulme - The Bone People 1986 Kingsley Amis - The Old Devils1987 Penelope Lively - Moon Tiger 1988 Peter Carey - Oscar and Lucinda1989 Kazuo Ishiguro - The Remains of the Day1990 A. S. Byatt - Possession1991 Ben Okri - The Famished Road 1992 Michael Ondaatje - The English Patient/Barry Unsworth - Sacred Hunger 1993 Roddy Doyle - Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha1994 James Kelman - How Late It Was, How Late1995 Pat Barker - The Ghost Road1996 Graham Swift - Last Orders1997 Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things1998 Ian McEwan - Amsterdam 1999 J. M. Coetzee - Disgrace2000 Margaret Atwood - The Blind Assassin2001 Peter Carey - True History of the Kelly Gang2002 Yann Martel - Life of Pi2003 DBC Pierre - Vernon God Little2004 Alan Hollinghurst - The Line of Beauty2005 John Banville - The Sea2006 Kiran Desai - The Inheritance of Loss2007 Anne Enright - The Gathering2008 Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger2009 Hilary Mantel - Wolf Hall2010 Howard Jacobson - The Finkler Question2011 Julian Barnes - The Sense of an Ending2012 Hilary Mantel - Bring Up the Bodies2013 Eleanor Catton - The Luminaries2014 Richard Flanagan- The Narrow Road to the Deep North2015 Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings 2016 Paul Beatty - The Sellout2017 George Saunders - Lincoln in the Bardo2018 Anna Burns - Milkman 2019 Margaret Atwood - The Testaments/Bernardine Evaristo - Girl, Woman, OtherSurprised by as many as 9? Of these, Oscar and Lucinda is by far my favourite, I’ve read it about eight times, Midnight’s Children would also make a list of ten books to keep if I could only read ten the rest of my life. Was pretty unimpressed by The Testaments (it’s already marked for our train station’s free books shelf), which was a shame because I loved The Handmaid’s Tale. I know I personally own about five more of these, and there’s at least twenty more around the house, so will probably expand the list during lockdown 2: nothing to do.
― seumas milm (gyac), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:16 (three years ago) link
a grand total of 2
1994 How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle
the Kelman is my favourite novel
― here comes the hotstamper (jim in vancouver), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:25 (three years ago) link
I've only read the 2x Coetzee books (Michael K is great imo). Love to read the Kelman, maybe Gordimer.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:43 (three years ago) link
oh the kelman is superb.
― Fizzles, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:47 (three years ago) link
17! including 6 of the last 7 (all but paul beatty). je ne regrette rien. milkman v good, the narrow road to the deep north v bad.
― neith moon (ledge), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:47 (three years ago) link
The English Patient was good. Beautiful evocative prose. Postcolonial with a decent amount of sex?(These things are important when you’re 15). Ended up reading some of his other work, liked In The Skin of a Lion a lot too. Obviously not overshadowed by the film/Seinfeld, but a good way to pass the time in itself.
― seumas milm (gyac), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 20:58 (three years ago) link
I missed some, I've read 10 actually, but none later than "Kelly Gang." I bought The Milkman and it seems great from looking at in the bookstore but just haven't gotten to it yet.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:14 (three years ago) link
I have never heard of J.G. Farrell and he won twice in close succession!
Since there's been hardly any discussion here of the Famished Road let me record here that a) I thought it was amazing and b) I remember absolutely nothing about it
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:15 (three years ago) link
Byatt, Kelwood, seems like enough tbh
― 1000 Scampo DJs (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:47 (three years ago) link
lol Kelman excuse my fingers
Ended up reading some of his other work, liked In The Skin of a Lion a lot too
I've never read a novel by Ondaatje I didn't like, and his poetry is quite good too. Definitely my favourite of the 'big' (anglophone) Canadian writers.
― pomenitul, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:51 (three years ago) link
A Brief History of Seven Killings is tremendous, surprised there isn't more love for it here.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:53 (three years ago) link
tbf that's the other one I want to read
― 1000 Scampo DJs (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:54 (three years ago) link
I've read sixteen of these I think including several I didn't know had won it.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:54 (three years ago) link
Oh I think I started Vernon God Little but it was atrocious. Howard Jacobson's Independent column was so terrible that I would rather read literally anything else on this list than even one paragraph of his.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:56 (three years ago) link
3. God of Small Things, Amsterdam, Milkman. I own Girl, Woman, Other but not got round to it yet. Quite a few authors that I've read other books by, though mostly boring middlebrow writers that I wouldn't read much more of (to be honest I might even be confusing Amsterdam with some other McEwan book, I read a fair few of his as a teen trying stuff out and feel like I wasted my time).
Out of the three I've read, Milkman towers above the other two (I think I said on another thread that I highly rate it, would recommend it without hesitation).
― emil.y, Wednesday, 14 October 2020 21:59 (three years ago) link
I've read 17, but only 3 of the 21st Century ones.
― Tsar Bombadil (James Morrison), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 23:24 (three years ago) link
Rites of Passage - studied at school. Is pretty good I guessPaddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha - read it ages ago and have completely forgotten itVernon God Little - I enjoyed it as a teenager, probably because that is its only demographicThe Line Of Beauty - masterpiece, there's every chance that if I read every book here it'd still be my favouriteThe White Tiger - a really good & shocking journalistic exposé first, a novel second
― Chip-vill-A (imago), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 23:29 (three years ago) link
The Line Of Beauty - masterpiece, there's every chance that if I read every book here it'd still be my favourite
Mine too. It's absolutely perfect. I've only read 7 of this updated list. Hard to imagine there's a worse book than Vernon God Little in this list. It has an awful "made-up story" quality, like something you'd invent in secondary school. The author had never even been to Texas or The South, btw, so there's a good reason it sounds made up. John Carey was the head judge that year.
― Gerneten-flüken cake (jed_), Wednesday, 14 October 2020 23:57 (three years ago) link
I have fond memories of Last Orders - Ash scattering pilgrimage for several old geezers stopping off at several pubs on the way - but it's 22 years since I read it so I've no idea if it stands up.
Also this is a boring pick at this stage but Hilary Mantel is one of the best modern writers I've read when it comes to writing about ambition and the nature of power. (Also Imago I'm surprised you haven't read at least one of them).
I agree The Line of Beauty is one of the best in this list, certainly of the ones I've read. Didn't care for Oscar and Lucinda.
I'm quite favourably disposed towards Hotel du Lac, which tends to be held up as one of those mistakes that should never happen again but there's a quiet sadness, a desperation to it that's very difficult to write effectively.
I've had both Possession and Midnight's Children on my shelf for years now but there always seems to be something more appealing to read. Maybe this will finally be the year.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 15 October 2020 07:19 (three years ago) link
Cosign all the Line of Beauty praise; The Ghost Road and The True History of the Kelly Gang are two others that I would stick up for. I couldn't really get with A Brief History of Seven Killings but I figured it was me not him.
― neith moon (ledge), Thursday, 15 October 2020 07:42 (three years ago) link
I’m kind of now tempted to read some more of the list, The Line of Beauty is one I’ve heard about for a while and I already have access to so many others. And I’ve also never heard a good word about Vernon God Little, lol?
― seumas milm (gyac), Thursday, 15 October 2020 08:57 (three years ago) link
Also I know Murdoch isn't especially popular here but I love The Sea, The Sea, the narrator is quite spectacularly awful and it contains some of the most revolting food anywhere in fiction.
Banville's The Sea is good as well. Cosign the Milkman love as well. IDK, there are lots of very good books on this list that don't really deserve the shade thrown on them by having shared a prize with outright turkeys like Amsterdam.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 15 October 2020 09:12 (three years ago) link
i had a thing where i made a point of reading the winner
1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1992 Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth (co-winner)1991 The Famished Road by Ben Okri1990 Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro1988 Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey
looks like i lasted 6 years. the Okri is sat over there unfinished...
have just this week bought The Sea The Sea (so good they named it twice)
― koogs, Thursday, 15 October 2020 09:51 (three years ago) link
read 7 I think and another 5 sitting in the to-read pile. Not at all the best or most important book on the list, but I enjoyed White Tiger the most of those I read
― thomasintrouble, Thursday, 15 October 2020 10:16 (three years ago) link
The win for Troubles was actually the 'Lost Booker' that was awarded by public vote in 2010
anyway, you should read Farrell. He's great
― Number None, Thursday, 15 October 2020 12:05 (three years ago) link
The Ghost Road and The True History of the Kelly Gang are two others that I would stick up for.wait! i was thinking of 'regeneration'. 'the ghost road' was the follow up and i wasn't into it as much, or the third one which i read anyway.
― neith moon (ledge), Thursday, 15 October 2020 12:13 (three years ago) link
this RTÉ radio documentary on the last 149 days of JG Farrell is amazing.
― Fizzles, Thursday, 15 October 2020 12:28 (three years ago) link
I’d never heard of JG Farrell either, but the colonialist stuff is hugely rtmi, so I’m getting his two books and The Line of Beauty
― seumas milm (gyac), Thursday, 15 October 2020 13:00 (three years ago) link
Go on then, I'll admit it - zero. Although I have read 9 Hugo winners from over the same time period, so that's something.
― logout option: disabled (Matt #2), Thursday, 15 October 2020 13:16 (three years ago) link
eleven or twelve - i can't remember if i read both of the hilary mantel books or just the first one. i've read "troubles" and "the siege of krishnapur" and thought they were both great.
― na (NA), Thursday, 15 October 2020 13:32 (three years ago) link
i can't remember if i read both of the hilary mantel books or just the first one
Was Anne Boelyn alive or dead at the end? (Apologies for the spoiler for everyone else, but she gets beheaded).
― Matt DC, Thursday, 15 October 2020 13:52 (three years ago) link
Fuck you DC! I'll never read them now!
― Chip-vill-A (imago), Thursday, 15 October 2020 14:11 (three years ago) link
Nah I should, and will
i really can't recall, it was too long ago. feel free to round my total down to 11 for purposes of booker cred points
― na (NA), Thursday, 15 October 2020 14:58 (three years ago) link
https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2020/november/letter-from-america
― xyzzzz__, Thursday, 26 November 2020 14:36 (three years ago) link
It isn’t so much that Scotland has achieved a grown-up reckoning with its social history (warts, booze, paedophiles and all), as that these wounds have become a source of cultural and political capital. Can't wait to visit, on the way to Vatican City! Classick clickbait, and of course no consid of the text atall; has he even read it.
― dow, Thursday, 26 November 2020 16:48 (three years ago) link
Think it was more a report focusing on Scotland attitudes to it's literary culture.
― xyzzzz__, Thursday, 26 November 2020 17:03 (three years ago) link
Yeah, but I read it as tainting the book by association with/"enabling" those people over there, who seem reduced: is it not possible that some may be nationalist significantly in terms of being anti-Brexit, anti-Tory for considerations that can be concerning beyond those who want to wear haggis and eat kilts and etc.? I mean, since he brought it up. The premise (they're going from one extreme to another) is worth developing, but stopping where he does seems like a dick move.
― dow, Thursday, 26 November 2020 17:59 (three years ago) link
This whole thing of reduction, conflation, sideways inflation is irritating: like on ilx, we'll soon see the annual kneejerk reaction against pollwinners because those people over there like them for the rong reasons/so much/at all, also on ilm I've seen Cardi B compared to Trump because she brags, a New Yorker writer compared Post Malone to Trump, said he pretty much is Trump, rather than another miserable little parasite (which he even looks like he knows he is, on some level)
― dow, Thursday, 26 November 2020 18:08 (three years ago) link
Nothing vs. you for your choice of link, but that's my caffeinated think.
― dow, Thursday, 26 November 2020 19:31 (three years ago) link
I must admit I have prejudged this book. it does sound like frank mccourt transposed. social realism in thatcherite Glasgow does sound on the nose and not necessarily what I want from a contemporary Scottish novel. having said that I really wish that it wasn't made to stand as an artifact of cultural devolution and in a normal country you would be able to write a grim social realist novel without having that kind of baggage attached.
― Politically homely (jim in vancouver), Thursday, 26 November 2020 19:47 (three years ago) link
I know I read Life of Pi and Bone PeopleTHink I may have read The English Patient, know i saw the film or it might stick out better but i do think I read the book too.THink I read Oscar and Lucinda if it's the one about the glass house on a boat, saw film too. Read a few of his around then
have a few of the others of the original cited list lying around the flkat unread.
& have read Wolf Hall, should have read Bring Out the Bodies by now since I found the prose of Wolf Hall really delicious.
only just realising that Bone People was a Booker winner looked like an interesting read when I found it i a Dublin charity or cheap book shop[ in the early 90s. Liked it at the time. Maori interactions and things, I think a maori woman trying to make it i more Western society, but that was like 28 years since i read it.
― Stevolende, Thursday, 26 November 2020 20:06 (three years ago) link
I've read 15 of that list.
Stand outs would be: The Ghost RoadMoon TigerDisgraceThe Life & Times of Michael KHotel Du Lac
I loved The Bone People at the time but I'd be terrified of re-reading it. I went with my now wife to Keri Hulme's home, er, town, when I was in NZ. Okarito, population 8*, on a lonely fly-blown tear of the west coast. We got dropped off up the road and walking in, a fella stopped in his car and offered us a lift. He said he was 'having a bath' that night, in his garden under the stars and we'd be welcome to come along. We didn't go and I think about it all the time.
*she wasn't there, so population 7, I guess.
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Thursday, 26 November 2020 21:07 (three years ago) link
John Banville, winner of the 2005 Booker Prize, has suggested that he could not win it now because he is a straight, white male https://t.co/hNT70dug1Z— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) December 1, 2020
― Number None, Wednesday, 2 December 2020 14:21 (three years ago) link
well i for one am shocked that Banville would come out with this
― Carry On Scamping (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 2 December 2020 14:25 (three years ago) link
I suggest you are a prick and wouldn't win it because everyone has seen through your overwritten shite.
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Wednesday, 2 December 2020 16:30 (three years ago) link
i like some of his overwritten shite but yeah, huge prick energy
― Carry On Scamping (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 2 December 2020 16:38 (three years ago) link
Also he's pissed away the last 20 years writing dour, pointless and tedious crime novels, plush a cash-in fake Raymond Chandler, so he's not exactly churning out the masterpieces these days.
― Tsar Bombadil (James Morrison), Wednesday, 2 December 2020 22:28 (three years ago) link
Hotel du Lac is lovely! A small, extremely earnest thing ('somewhat Sparklike but more modern and lost' was my immediate response, which also puts it in Rhys territory tbh) that nonetheless pulls a number of sly games en route to terminus. Probably fits in second behind TLOB for me now, a book to which this makes a decent counterpoint, perhaps.
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:28 (two years ago) link
I've read
2004 The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst2002 Life of Pi by Yann Martel2000 The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood1999 Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee1993 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle 1992 The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje (co-winner)1989 The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro 1986 The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis
And that's it. I didn't adore any of them, really... the Coetzee in particular seemed to have a thesis that I instinctively thought was weird and bad even when I read it in my early 20s.
Exception to this, of course, was "The Line Of Beauty", which I'm unashamed to state is one of my favourite novels of all time... not just as an effective work of AIDS-related art, and a commentary on Thatcherism, but such an effective skewering of the bourgeois shittiness of "gay" on the whole.
― what's fgti up to these days? nothing. she's fake (flamboyant goon tie included), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:00 (two years ago) link
Yeah it really stands clear, my previous post notwithstanding
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:07 (two years ago) link
Since 2005 I've increased my tally from one to six and I thought most of them were fine, but the fact of their Booker Prize was totally irrelevant to my choosing to read them. My participation in I Love Books has been far more influential in leading me to good books.
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:08 (two years ago) link
Re what Banville said above, just in the last ten years Howard Jacobson, Julian Barnes, and George Saunders have all won. Is he mad that three women and a gay man won in a row after Saunders?
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 00:15 (two years ago) link
the Coetzee in particular seemed to have a thesis that I instinctively thought was weird and bad even when I read it in my early 20s.
― what's fgti up to these days? nothing. she's fake (flamboyant goon tie included), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 23:00 (ye
What's the thesis you didn't like?
― abcfsk, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 11:45 (two years ago) link