Reading guide: Possession by A.S. Byatt
Winning the Booker Prize in 1990, Possession follows two modern-day scholars as they uncover a secret affair between famous fictional poets, all the while falling in love themselves.
The winner of the 1990 Booker Prize. Two modern-day academics uncover a secret affair between famous fictional poets in A.S. Byatt’s gloriously exhilarating novel of wit and romance.
Maud Bailey is a scholar researching the life and work of her distant relative, a little-known 19th-century poet named Christabel LaMotte. Roland Mitchell is looking into an obscure moment in the life of another Victorian poet, the celebrated Randolph Henry Ash. Together, the two uncover a dark secret in Ash’s life: though apparently happily married, he conducted a torrid affair with LaMotte. As Maud and Roland dig deeper, they too find themselves falling in love.
A.S. Byatt
About the Author
A.S. Byatt won the Booker Prize in 1990 with Possession and was shortlisted in 2009 with The Children’s Book. Writing, she said, ‘is simply the most important thing in my life’
Watch our films
Other nominated books by A.S. Byatt
A.S. Byatt’s vivid and deeply affecting historical fiction is the story of a singular family, played out against the great, rippling tides of the day.
