The winner will be announced i November next year. (Source: The Booker Prizes/Twitter) The judges for Booker Prize 2021 have been disclosed. The panel for next year will be chaired by historian Maya Jasanoff, and consists of writer Horatia Harrod; actor Natascha McElhone, writer and former Archbishop Rowan Williams, and novelist and professor Chigozie Obioma.
“When Douglas Stuart won the 2020 Booker Prize, he told Bernardine Evaristo, from whom he took the baton, that she had ‘lifted all voices’ and that he hoped to do her proud in the year to come. Booker Prize judges never speculate about the spirit in which the winner will accept the prize — their remit is to choose the best book, nothing else. But the warmth with which recent winners have been received by readers is a heartening consequence: the more people believe The Booker Prize is for them, the better it will be for good writing and good reading overall. If part of the Booker’s long-term effect is to encourage a range of excellence in new writing, it does so by showing that a welcoming group of readers exists for that work. The 2021 panel of judges is stellar in that respect: distinguished and exacting, open-minded and hopeful. They are led by an historian whose global view of literature and its context is eminently equal to this global prize. I can’t wait to hear them discuss the results of their reading together,” Gaby Wood, Literary Director of the Booker Prize Foundation, was quoted as saying in their website.
We are delighted to announce that the #2021BookerPrize judges will be: historian Maya Jasanoff (chair); writer & editor @horatiaharrod; actor @nataschaandsons; novelist & professor Chigozie Obioma; and writer & former archbishop Rowan Williams. Read more: https://t.co/8jWDfFOI18 pic.twitter.com/tecg5AK20M
— The Booker Prizes (@TheBookerPrizes) December 16, 2020
In July, the ‘Booker Dozen’ of 12 or 13 books will be announced. This will be followed by a shortlist of six books in the autumn. The winner will be announced in November 2021.
