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Christopher Reid Wins 2009 Costa Book of the Year
27/01/2010
London, 20.30pm 26th January 2010: Poet Christopher Reid has won the 2009 Costa Book of the Year award for his collection, A Scattering, a tribute to his wife Lucinda Gane following her death in 2005. The announcement was made this evening (Tuesday 26th January) at an awards ceremony held at Quaglino's in central London.
The Costa Book Awards recognise the most enjoyable books of the last year by writers based in the UK and Ireland. Originally established by Whitbread PLC in 1971, Costa announced its takeover of the sponsorship of the UK's prestigious and popular book prize in 2006.
Reid beat odds-on favourite Colm Tóibίn for Brooklyn, debut biographer Graham Farmelo for The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Quantum Genius, first-time novelist Raphael Selbourne for Beauty and children's author Patrick Ness for The Ask and the Answer, to win the overall prize and a cheque for £30,000 at the awards ceremony.
Following the judging, Josephine Hart, chair of the final judges, said: "Out of a personal tragedy, Christopher Reid has written a masterwork which has universal power. Austere, beautiful and moving - we all felt this is a book we would want everyone to read. Packed full of unforgettable lines, A Scattering is a remarkable piece."
A Scattering, published by Arete Books, is the sixth collection of poetry to take the overall prize. Seamus Heaney was the last poet to win the Book of the Year with a collection of poetry, taking the prize in 1999 for Beowulf.
Since the introduction of the Book of the Year award in 1985, it has been won nine times by a novel, four times by a first novel, five times by a biography, five times by a collection of poetry and once by a children's book.
For more information please visit http://www.costabookawards.com/.
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For further press information or to arrange an interview with Christopher Reid, please contact:
Amanda Johnson
Costa Book Awards Press and Publicity
Telephone: 020 7751 2085 (direct line) or 07715 922180 (mobile)
Email: amanda@amandajohnsonpr.com
or
Claire Lowdon
Arete Books
Email: aretebooks@gmail.com
Telephone: 01865 289 193
Notes for Editors:
- The Costa Book Awards, formerly the Whitbread Book Awards, were established in 1971 to encourage, promote and celebrate the best contemporary British writing.
- The total prize fund for the Costa Book Awards stands at £55,000.
- The award winners from the five categories - Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children's Book - each receive £5,000.
- The overall Costa Book of the Year is selected from the five category Award winners with the winner receiving a further £30,000.
- To be eligible for the 2009 awards, books must have been first published in the UK or Ireland between 1 November 2008 and 31 October 2009.
- The 2009 Costa Book of the Year was The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry (Faber and Faber).
- Since being announced as the Book of the Year, The Secret Scripture has gone on to sell over 300,000 copies and has become the fastest-selling book in the history of Faber and Faber.
About Costa:
- Costa was founded by Italian brothers Sergio and Bruno Costa in 1971.
- Costa Coffee was the first UK coffee shop chain to commit sourcing beans from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms.
- Costa's in-store baristas are all coached in the art of coffee making at the company's unique Costa Coffee Academy based at its own roastery in Lambeth, London.
- The Costa Foundation was set up in 2006 to give something back to the communities within the countries from which Costa sources its coffee beans. The Costa Foundation works with an independent charity partner, Charities Trust, and is operating under the auspices of Charities Trust's registered charity number 327489.
- Costa is part of the Whitbread family of brands.
- For more information, please go to http://www.costa.co.uk/
Further BackgroundA Scattering by Christopher Reid
Arete Books
About the book:
Lucinda Gane, Christopher Reid's wife, died in October 2005. A Scattering is his tribute to her and consists of four poetic sequences, the first written during her final illness, and the other three at intervals after her death.
About the author:
Christopher Reid was born in Hong Kong in 1949. He studied at Oxford before becoming a journalist and book reviewer. He was Poetry Editor at Faber and Faber from 1991 to 1999, and Professor in Creative Writing at the University of Hull from 2007 to 2009. He also runs his own independent publishing house, Ondt and Gracehoper, and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Reid's poetry collections include Arcadia (1979), which won both the Somerset Maugham Award and the Hawthornden prize, Katerina Brac (1985) and All Sorts, his first book of poems for children, which won the Signal Poetry Award in 2000.
A Scattering and The Song of Lunch were both published in 2009. As well as the Costa Poetry Award, A Scattering has also been nominated for Britain's two other top poetry awards - the Forward Poetry Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry. He was twice nominated for the Whitbread Poetry Award. His edition of Letters of Ted Hughes, published originally in 2007, was recently released in paperback. He lives in London.
What the judges said:
"Intensely moving, compelling and honest - this is a highly readable collection of wonderful poems."
Judges:
Chloe Garner: Director, Ledbury Poetry Festival
Sophie Hannah: Crime Fiction Writer and Poet
Tom Fleming: Deputy Editor, Literary Review
Shortlist, selected from a total of 100 entries: | Clive James | Angels Over Elsinore | Picador Poetry | | Katharine Kilalea | One Eye'd Leigh | Carcanet Press | | Ruth Padel | Darwin: A Life in Poems | Chatto & Windus |
Previous Biography Award winners include:| Adam Foulds | The Broken Word | 2008 | | Jean Sprackland | Tilt | 2007 | | John Haynes | Letter to Patience | 2006 | | Christopher Logue | Cold Calls | 2005 | | Michael Symmons | Roberts Corpus | 2004 | | Don Paterson | Landing Light | 2003 |
Previous Winners of the Book of the Year
| 2008
| The Secret Scripture
| Sebastian Barry
| Novel
|
| 2007
| Day
| A.L. Kennedy
| Novel
|
| 2006
| The Tenderness of Wolves
| Stef Penney
| First Novel
|
| 2005
| Matisse: the Master
| Hilary Spurling
| Biography
|
| 2004
| Small Island
| Andrea Levy
| Novel
|
| 2003
| The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
| Mark Haddon
| Novel
|
| 2002
| Samuel Pepys:The Unequalled Self
| Claire Tomalin
| Biography
|
| 2001
| The Amber Spyglass
| Philip Pullman
| Children's Book
|
| 2000
| English Passengers
| Matthew Kneale
| Novel
|
| 1999
| Beowulf
| Seamus Heaney
| Poetry
|
| 1998
| Birthday Letters
| Ted Hughes
| Poetry
|
| 1997
| Tales from Ovid
| Ted Hughes
| Poetry
|
| 1996
| The Spirit Level
| Seamus Heaney
| Poetry
|
| 1995
| Behind the Scenes at the Museum
| Kate Atkinson
| First Novel
|
| 1994
| Felicia's Journey
| William Trevor
| Novel
|
| 1993
| Theory of War
| Joan Brady
| Novel
|
| 1992
| Swing Hammer Swing!
| Jeff Torrington
| First Novel
|
| 1991
| A Life of Picasso
| John Richardson
| Biography
|
| 1990
| Hopeful Monsters
| Nicholas Mosley
| Novel
|
| 1989
| Coleridge: Early Visions
| Richard Holmes
| Biography
|
| 1988
| The Comforts of Madness
| Paul Sayer
| First Novel
|
| 1987
| Under the Eye of the Clock
| Christopher Nolan
| Biography
|
| 1986
| An Artist of the Floating World
| Kazuo Ishiguro
| Novel
|
| 1985
| Elegies
| Douglas Dunn
| Poetry
|
|
|
