LONDON – Paul Murray’s The Bee Sting, a tragicomedy about a family on the brink of financial ruin, and Jonathan Escoffery’s If I Survive You, which explores an American of Jamaican descent’s struggles with identity, are among six titles shortlisted for 2023’s Booker Prize.
The two American authors are competing to win one of the highest-profile awards in literature.
The shortlist, announced during an event at the National Portrait Gallery in London on Thursday, also includes British-Indian author Chetna Maroo’s Western Lane, about a squash prodigy coping with grief, and American writer Paul Harding’s This Other Eden, about an isolated mixed-race community that is troubled by outsiders.
Canadian author Sarah Bernstein’s Study For Obedience, about a woman who travels to her brother’s home only to find that the local population is scared of her, and Irish author Paul Lynch’s Prophet Song, in which Ireland is reimagined as a totalitarian state, are the other two titles.
The six books all gestured at “the unease of our moment”, said Esi Edugyan, a Canadian novelist and the chair of 2023’s judging panel. The novels included “portraits of societies pushed to the edge of tolerance” and unflinching examinations of generational trauma, Edugyan added in a statement announcing the list.
The Booker Prize, which was founded in 1969, is awarded each year to the author of a novel written in English and published in Britain or Ireland. It regularly helps birth literary stars.
In 2022, Sri Lankan author Shehan Karunatilaka won for The Seven Moons Of Maali Almeida, a satire exploring the trauma of his country’s civil war.
Other recent winners include South Africa’s Damon Galgut, Scottish-American writer Douglas Stuart and British author Bernardine Evaristo.
The 13-strong longlist for 2023’s prize, announced in August, was notable for containing four debut novels, and lacking household names.
Sebastian Barry’s Old God’s Time, about a policeman whose quiet retirement is interrupted by an old case, was the highest-profile title. However, the Irish novelist did not make Thursday’s shortlist.
Robert Webb, a British actor, author and one of the judges, said at a news conference that omitting Barry’s novel had been very difficult but “there are only six places”.
Of the four longlisted debuts, only two – Maroo’s Western Lane and Escoffery’s If I Survive You – survived what Edugyan said were 4½ hours of “very collegiate, but intense” deliberations. “We got there in the end,” Edugyan added. “Everybody was still speaking to each other.”
The judges, who also include British actor Adjoa Andoh, Hong Kong-born poet Mary Jean Chan and American Shakespearean scholar James Shapiro, will now read the shortlisted books a final time before announcing the winner during a ceremony in London on Nov 26. The winning author will receive £50,000 (S$83,900). NYTIMES
