The man stood on the podium
Whence all but he had fled
A poet in the room cried out,
‘You’re white! You’re old! Drop dead!’
the (moderately) modest records of a (moderately) modest man
Labels: Man Booker Prize
The winner of the Man Booker prize for 2005 will be announced in about 45 minutes time at a glittering ceremony at the Guildhall in London - it will be around 10pm local time. BBC2 is providing live national television coverage. Will Good Morning Australia be crossing over to cover it? Perhaps not.
At any rate, this green cloth-covered eccentricity by Julian Barnes is the bookies favorite to win. But while it is hard not to include Flaubert's Parrot (1985) in any list of all time greats, Barnes has been spiralling downwards ever since and this workmanlike, enjoyable tale doesn't really reverse the trend.
Actually it's rather reminiscent of David Lodge's recent retelling of the last years of Henry James' life, and his unfortunate foray into the theatre - Author! Author! (2004)- which had the same oddly disengaged authorial stance. As in, hmm, time to write another book, don't care about much anymore, how about a historical reconstruction?
Or is to say that to naively miss the allegorical dimension, the commentary on injustice and race in contemporary Britain? Don't think so, sorry, no.
Went down to Dymocks at Worldy to pick up reserved copies of Julian Barnes’ Arthur and George and John Banville’s The Sea as part of a vaguely highbrow plan to read through the Booker shortlist. And Michelle behind the counter said, ‘Wanna freebee?’ and tossed Rubdown by Leigh Redhead in the bag as well. Started it with low expectations, but what a pageturner… funny, sharp, zippy/unzippy and quite rude in spots. Great sense of place (er,