A British novel based on the Troubles in Northern Ireland has won this year’s Man Booker Prize, beating Canadian Esi Edugyan, who lost out on the £50,000 ($85,000) prize for the second time.
Anna Burns’s book Milkman was considered a long shot by oddsmakers, who had ranked it second-last among the six finalists. Bookies had picked Ms. Edugyan’s novel, Washington Black, as one of the favourites to win, along with The Overstory by American Richard Powers. Ms. Edugyan, who lives in Victoria, also made the shortlist in 2011 for her second novel, Half Blood Blues. Each Man Booker finalist receives £2,500 ($4,200).
“To be here a second time was just incredible. I had no expectation of that and so I was floored that I was even shortlisted. It’s been an amazing ride and I’m so happy for Anna,” Ms. Edugyan said after the announcement.
She acknowledged that she had yet to read any of the other shortlisted books, citing superstition. “I was waiting until after,” she said. “I’ll start with hers.”
The Booker Prize “does a tremendous amount to raise the stature of your novel in the world and so I’m happy for the exposure and honoured by the nomination,” she added. “Now I feel I can relax. I can drink my wine. I’ve earned it.”
Ms. Burns’s win for Milkman will be a surprise to many because of its unusual structure. Even the chair of the panel of judges found the book a challenge to read, with its lengthy paragraphs, casual punctuation and unnamed characters. Set in an anonymous city in the 1970s, the book draws on Ms. Burns’s years growing up in Belfast during decades of sectarian violence known as the Troubles that pitted factions of Protestants against Catholics. The story is told through the voice, and particular dialect, of an 18-year-old woman trying to negotiate a complicated life filled with violence, gossip, rumour, sexual harassment and a forced relationship with the milkman who is also a senior paramilitary operative.
“I think it’s a very powerful novel about the damage and danger of rumour,” said Kwame Anthony Appiah, who chaired the panel of five judges. Mr. Appiah acknowledged that the book was not an easy read and he said some people may find it better as an audio book. “The novel is enormously rewarding if you persist with it,” he said. “It is true that because of the flow of the language and the length of the sentences and the fact that some of the language is unfamiliar, that it’s not kind of a light read.” He added that the book “is challenging in the way a walk up [Mount] Snowdon is challenging. It’s definitely worth it because the view is terrific when you get to the top.”
He added that the story is also timely in that it evokes many of the issues surrounding sexual harassment raised by the #Metoo movement. The book is about a “woman living in a divided society harassed by a man. He’s taking advantage of divisions in the society to use the power he has because of those divisions to go after her. Her situation is made worse by gossip and rumour,” he said.
It’s also timely given the debate surrounding the fate of the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland in the Brexit negotiations between Britain and the European Union. The border has been largely invisible since 1998 when the Good Friday Agreement ended the Troubles. However, once the U.K. is out of the EU next March, it will also be out of the bloc’s single market which allows for the free movement of goods, services and people. Both sides have said they don’t want a return to a hard border, but they have yet to find a solution. Mr. Appiah said the sectarian divisions in Ireland “are the reasons why Brexit is going to have problems with the border in Ireland, [and] of course that plays an enormous role in the novel,” he said. He added that Ireland was not the only place in the world with sectarian divisions. “This novel is as useful for thinking about Lebanon or Syria,” he said.
Ms. Burns, 56, has written two other novels, No Bones and Little Constructions. This is her first major literary award and it’s the first time the Booker has been awarded to a novelist from Northern Ireland.
The Booker Prize dates to 1969 and for years was largely awarded only to Commonwealth writers whose work had been published in the U.K. The rules were changed in 2013 to include Americans, prompting much controversy in literary circles among those who felt U.S. writers would dominate the award. Two American books have won the prize since the rule change; Paul Beatty’s The Sellout in 2016 and George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo in 2017. Mr. Appiah said the judges didn’t consider the nationality or gender of the authors and he added that he found the debate about Americans tedious. “I’m so fed up with that conversation,” he said. “The best book wasn’t a book by an American.”
Paul Waldie