US author George Saunders became only the second American writer to win Britain’s renowned Man Booker Prize, which was awarded for his first full-length novel Lincoln in the Bardo.
Judges for the prestigious English-language literary award praised as “utterly original” the book that chronicles the death of Abraham Lincoln’s 11-year-old son Willie using the accounts of hundreds of narrators.
This year’s Man Booker Prize shortlist pitted three US and three British writers against one another. The award, launched in 1969, was only open to writers from Commonwealth states until it began permitting authors from other English-speaking countries in 2014.
Last year Paul Beatty became the first American to win the award for his novel The Sellout. Saunders was the British bookmakers’ favourite ahead of the announcement on Tuesday. In a lengthy and varied writing career, he has penned award-winning short story collections, essays, illustrated fables and a bestselling children’s book, as well as many pieces of journalism.