By Adam McDowell
Margaret Laurence has been dead for 23 years, but she again has a chance to finally win a Man Booker Prize.
Along with 21 other novels by Commonwealth and Irish writers that were published in 1970, Laurence’s The Fire-Dwellers will get a belated shot at one of the most prestigious prizes in English literature this spring.
Forty years ago, a gap in the eligibility period created a literary limbo into which Laurence’s novel about family life, and many others, fell. Now prize organizers are redressing the issue with a special award to be handed to one author, living or dead.
Ion Trewin, literary director of the Man Booker Prizes, said: “Our longlist demonstrates that 1970 was a remarkable year for fiction written in English. Recognition for these novels and the eventual winner is long overdue.”
The Man Booker has appointed a panel of three judges, all of whom were born in or around 1970, to select a shortlist of six novels from a longlist of 22. The judges — all of them English, despite the prize’s openness to novels from across the Commonwealth, Ireland and Zimbabwe — are journalist and critic Rachel Cooke, newsreader Katie Derham and the poet and novelist Tobias Hill.
The shortlist will be announced in March and, as with the Best of the Booker in 2008, the public will decide the winner by voting via the prize’s website. The overall winner will be announced in May.
The trouble started in 1971, two years after the Booker Prize began. It stopped being awarded for books published the previous year and became, as it is today, a prize for the best novel appearing in the same year. The date on which the award was given was also moved from the spring to the fall. The upshot was a period of several months, from April to November 1970, during which a wealth of fiction was published but would not be eligible for consideration.
Incidentally, 1970 was also the year during which French literary theorist Roland Barthes published his seminal book S/Z, in which he advocated the rereading of stories, including old literature, as a way to discover fresh meaning within them.
The longlist of works to be rediscovered weighs heavily in favour of Englishmen and women; Laurence is the only Canadian.
Standing out among the names are several distinguished writers whose books stood the test of time. For instance, readers may recognize the names of JG Farrell, whose The Siege of Krishnapur won the prize in 1973, and Iris Murdoch, whose The Sea, The Sea won in 1978 and whose novels were shortlisted six times prior to her death in 1999.
Ten of the 22 authors on the list have since passed away. Among the deceased are Murdoch; Patrick O’Brian, who is nominated for his popular naval adventure Master and Commander; and Christy Brown, an Irish author and artist who is nominated for best known for My Left Foot, an autobiography that explored the effects of his cerebral palsy. He died in 1981.
As science fiction fans know, time-travelling can have odd and paradoxical consequences.
For instance, if Laurence won, The Fire-Dwellers would become the earliest Canadian book to win a Booker, but not the first to win. That distinction would remain with Michael Ondaatje, whose novel The English Patient led to a Booker in 1992 (he shared the award with Briton Barry Unsworth).
A victory for the outrageous Joe Orton could be viewed as “double-posthumous” in that he was already dead during the 1970 period of eligibility. The 34-year-old playwright and novelist was murdered in 1967, and his novel Head To Toe was published three years later.
Shiva Naipaul, a Trinidadian who died of a heart attack aged 40 in 1985, was the younger brother of V.S. Naipaul — who won the prize in 1971.
Ironically, winning a Booker brings far more attention to the author today than it would have in 1970, said Lynn Wells, a specialist in British contemporary fiction who has taught a course about the Booker Prize at the University of Regina.
Back then, the prize had not yet attained the notoriety it enjoys today. “I don’t think it really hit its stride until 1981, when Rushdie when won for Midnight’s Children,” said Wells, an associate professor at the U of R's English department.
Also, notwithstanding the official enthusiasm, Wells said 1970 was not a particularly strong year or era for literature from England, which makes up more than three-quarters of the list.
“In 1970 you’ve got experimental fiction going on all over the world, in France you’ve got the nouveau roman; in South America and the U.S. you’ve got all sorts really experimental and interesting things with fiction.
“In England it wasn’t happening,” she continued. “The English novel was pretty much stuck.”Looking at the Booker 1970 list, Wells said, “These are not, in my mind, big, memorable novels, any of them. That’s often the case with the Booker.”___________
The full longlist is below:Brian Aldiss, The Hand Reared BoyH.E.Bates, A Little Of What You Fancy?Nina Bawden, The Birds On The TreesMelvyn Bragg, A Place In EnglandChristy Brown, Down All The DaysLen Deighton, BomberJ.G.Farrell, TroublesElaine Feinstein, The CircleShirley Hazzard, The Bay Of NoonReginald Hill, A Clubbable WomanSusan Hill, I'm The King Of The CastleFrancis King, A Domestic AnimalMargaret Laurence, The Fire DwellersDavid Lodge, Out Of The ShelterIris Murdoch, A Fairly Honourable DefeatShiva Naipaul, FirefliesPatrick O'Brian, Master and CommanderJoe Orton, Head To ToeMary Renault, Fire From HeavenRuth Rendell, A Guilty Thing SurprisedMuriel Spark, The Driver's SeatPatrick White, The Vivisector