A family epic about love and disappointment, condensed and clarified through the remarkable lens of Anne Enright's unblinking eye.
By Anne Enright
The Man Booker Prize 2007
Anne Enright hears the winner announcement
Another Irish winner, disgruntled bookies, and more chat as to what constitutes a novel. No shortlisted book can be a surprise winner but Anne Enright’s The Gathering came close.
In the lead up to Enright’s win, the issued that aerated the literary world was whether Ian McEwan’s shortlisted On Chesil Beach was really a novel. At a svelte 40,000 words was it in fact a novella and so ineligible? No, said the judges.
Not that it mattered, despite huge sales and the tag of favourite, it was pipped in what the chair of judges, Howard Davies, called a ‘tight’ contest. Enright cautioned would-be readers that if they wanted a feel-good novel ‘they shouldn’t really pick up my book’.
Winner The Booker Prize 2007
- By
- Anne Enright
- Published by
- Jonathan Cape
A family epic about love and disappointment, condensed and clarified through the remarkable lens of Anne Enright's unblinking eye.
The shortlist
Nicola Barker’s startling visionary narrative. If history is just a sick joke that keeps repeating itself, then who exactly is telling it - and why?
A Pakistani immigrant who since 9/11 has become alienated with the USA tells his story to an American stranger in Mohsin Hamid's mesmerising novel.
By Mohsin Hamid
Lloyd Jones celebrates the inspirational power of fiction in his moving story about a young girl on a war-torn island in the South Pacific.
By Lloyd Jones
Ian McEwan’s devastating novel about ways in which the entire course of a life can be changed by a gesture not made or a word not spoken.
By Ian McEwan
Indra Sinha’s portrait of a survivor is a stunningly humane work of storytelling that takes us right to the heart of contemporary India.
By Indra Sinha
