Back to Prizes Home PageCalled the Booker, this is by common consent the most prestigious award available to British novelists. Sponsored by Booker-McConnell plc, a food wholesaling company, it has been offered since 1969. In 1993 Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, the 1981 award winner, was named the "Booker of Bookers," the outstanding Booker winner of the first twenty-five years. It is administered by the Book Council; publishers submit nominated books, though the judges can "call in" or request others; the panel of judges consists of five persons, usually literary editors, novelists, and nonliterary celebrities, and they announce a "shortlist" of finalists, usually five books, some four or five weeks before the ceremony at which the winner is revealed. Large sums of money are wagered on the Booker Prize, odds for which are established by bookmakers immediately after the shortlist is announced. The award ceremony itself is a gala affair at London's Guildhall, televised live.
Any novel written by a citizen of the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, or the British Commonwealth is eligible to win the Booker for a novel which must have been published in the English language and initially in the United Kingdom. The Prize is currently worth £21,000.
The Booker Prize is currently in flux. The original sponsors, the Booker-McConnell company, were bought out by another frozen-food concern called Iceland, which declined to continue the sponsorship. A firm called the Man Group, a London-based international stockbroking firm, agreed to take over sponsorship of what is projected to become the Man Booker Prize. One step was to raise the amount of money awarded the winner. The Independent reported on April 26, 2002, that the award would now be worth £50,000, up dramatically from the previous figure of £21,000. There has been some discussion of opening the eligibility to US citizens, a proposition which has been hotly debated.
| 1969 | P. H. Newby, Something to Answer For |
| 1970 | Bernice Rubens, The Elected Member |
| 1971 | V. S. Naipaul, In a Free State |
| 1972 | John Berger, G |
| 1973 | J. G. Farrell, The Siege of Krishnapur |
| 1974 | Stanley Middleton, Holiday Nadine Gordimer, The Conservationist |
| 1975 | Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Heat and Dust |
| 1976 | David Storey, Saville |
| 1977 | Paul Scott, Staying On |
| 1978 | Iris Murdoch, The Sea, The Sea |
| 1979 | Penelope Fitzgerald, Offshore |
| 1980 | William Golding, Rites of Passage |
| 1981 | Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children |
| 1982 | Thomas Keneally, Schindler's Ark |
| 1983 | J. M. Coetzee, Life and Times of Michael K |
| 1984 | Anita Brookner, Hotel du Lac |
| 1985 | Keri Hulme, The Bone People |
| 1986 | Kingsley Amis, The Old Devils |
| 1987 | Penelope Lively, Moon Tiger |
| 1988 | Peter Carey, Oscar and Lucinda |
| 1989 | Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day |
| 1990 | A. S. Byatt, Possession |
| 1991 | Ben Okri, The Famished Road |
| 1992 | Barry Unsworth, Sacred
Hunger Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient |
| 1993 | Roddy Doyle, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha |
| 1994 | James Kelman, How Late It Was, How Late |
| 1995 | Pat Barker, The Ghost Road |
| 1996 | Graham Swift, Last Orders |
| 1997 | Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things |
| 1998 | Ian McEwan, Amsterdam |
| 1999 | J. M. Coetzee, Disgrace |
| 2000 | Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin |
| 2001 | Peter Carey, True History of the Kelly Gang |
| 2002 | Yann Martel, Life of Pi |
| 2003 | DBC Pierre, Vernon God Little |
| 2004 | Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty |
| 2005 | John Banville, The Sea |
| 2006 | Kiran Desai, The Inheritance of Loss |
Back to Prizes Home Page