Man Booker Shortlist

Man Booker Prize for Fiction supports UK libraries

Special event in October with shortlisted writers

26 September 2011

For the first time, the Man Booker Prize for Fiction will host a one-off event to show its support for UK libraries in a time of great upheaval. Taking place at the British Library on Tuesday 11 October, one week ahead of the 2011 winner announcement, the event will feature three of the shortlisted authors - Carol Birch, Stephen Kelman and A.D. Miller - speaking to an audience of librarians and library groups from across the UK about the importance of libraries in their lives.

With 322 million visits made to the UK's public libraries each year, the Man Booker Prize acknowledges the vital role libraries have both for readers and writers across the country. The prize has worked with libraries across Britain for many years, promoting the prize to library users and providing materials for librarians to enthuse library reading groups, with over 35% of the UK's 4,612 libraries promoting the prize. In addition, the prize sponsors six library reading groups to shadow the judges, contribute to the debates around the longlist and shortlist on the Man Booker Prize website, and ultimately decide their own winner.

Ion Trewin, Literary Director of the Booker Prize Foundation , comments: "The support we are giving here at a time when libraries across much of the nation are being closed or under threat demonstrates how important Man Booker believes them to be. In addition to attending this event, we hope reading groups across the country will use the Man Booker Prize website to find out more about the shortlisted titles in the running for the 2011 prize. Our reader's guides cover all of this year's thirteen longlisted titles, providing discussion points for reading groups and suggestions of other books along the same theme."

The event will be chaired by Tony Durcan OBE, Director of Culture, Libraries & Lifelong Learning at Newcastle City Council. Newcastle provides an excellent example of library involvement with the prize, with the city's libraries having launched their own ‘Toon Man Booker' this year. Library visitors can vote for their favourite shortlisted title ahead of the Toon Man Booker winner being announced at a gala evening at City Library on the 18 October, the same night as the overall prize winner is announced at Guildhall in London.

Annie Mauger, Chief Executive of CILIP, the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, adds: "I am delighted that Man Booker and the shortlisted authors are showing their support for libraries through this event and the shadowing activity. So many authors have said how much they owe to libraries and recognise the world of imagination that they opened up for them. Libraries support literacy which is so fundamental to developing life skills and chances. This essential resource needs to stay at the heart of our communities."

The other UK shortlisted author Julian Barnes, who sadly wasn't able to attend the event, praised UK libraries saying: "Like most writers of my generation, I grew up with the weekly exchange of library books, and took their pleasures and treasures for granted. The cost of our free public library system is small, its value immense. To diminish and dismantle it would be a kind of national self-mutilation, as stupid as it would be wicked."

The six books on the 2011 shortlist are: The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes, Jamrach's Menagerie by Carol Birch, The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt, Half Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan, Pigeon English by Stephen Kelman and Snowdrops by A.D. Miller. The judges for the 2011 prize are writer and journalist, Matthew d'Ancona; author, Susan Hill; author and politician, Chris Mullin; and Head of Books at the Daily Telegraph, Gaby Wood. Dame Stella Rimington is the Chair.

For further information about the prize please visit www.themanbookerprize.com or follow the prize on Twitter @ManBookerPrize or on Facebook.

For all press enquiries please contact
Katy MacMillan-Scott or Amy Barder at Colman Getty
Tel: 020 7631 2666
Email: katy@colmangetty.co.uk / amybarder@colmangetty.co.uk

 

The Man Booker Prize Fiction at its finest