The recent failure of the Pulitzer board to award a 2012 prize for fiction prompted quite an uproar. The publishing industry put up its dukes and flailed away at the perceived insult to its 2011 fiction lists.
The brouhaha actually worked out in productive ways. Many people (see And the winner isn't... and The Great Pulitzer Do-Over ) took the opportunity to champion their favorite 2011 novels, bringing attention to a wide range of worthwhile books.* That's a good thing!
It made me reflect on the vagaries of the book prize process, though, and at the risk of being called unpatriotic, I'd say the British handle their literary awards system more efficiently. They announce an initial 15-book "longlist", cut it down to a 5-6 book "shortlist", and then award the prize. Lots of publicity is focused on that extensive longlist, and being placed on the shortlist is seen as the real stamp of approval, with the actual award a bit of an anticlimax. (Similar to the Oscars.) Avid readers really appreciate those longlists.
Of course, the British do have their own controversies. The judges for the 2011 Man Booker Prize, the UK's top literary award, noted that they were going to take "readability" into account in their deliberations. Quel horreur! The literary community was incensed. It didn't help that the ultimate selection for the prize, THE SENSE OF AN ENDING, was widely seen as a tepid choice.
But I'm looking forward to next year's Booker Prize anyway. Why? Because I am so very amused that one of the five members of the 2012 judging panel is actor Dan Stevens, better known to many of us as Matthew Crawley of "Downton Abbey". (I kid you not. Oh, all right, he does have a degree in literature from Cambridge.) Those Brits sure know how to have more fun.
Mary Hoskinson-Dean
*It's not over 'til it's over? The Pulitzer jury describes "what really happened this year"
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