Porter and Barker shortlisted for 2019 Gordon Burn Prize

The shortlist has been announced for the seventh annual Gordon Burn Prize with two nods for Faber, including Max Porter, as well as nominations for three Penguin Random House authors including Pat Barker.

Porter’s second book, Lanny, is vying for the prize alongside Faber stablemate For the Good Times by David Keenan. The three PRH nominations include The Silence of the Girls (Penguin) by Pat Barker (pictured), Girl, Woman, Other, (Hamish Hamilton) by Bernadine Evaristo and Nafissa Thompson-Spires’ Heads of the Colored People (Chatto & Windus). This Brutal House (Dialogue Books) by Niven Govinden is also recognised on the six-strong shortlist. 

Ten years on from the death of writer Gordon Burn, the prize “highlights and rewards work that is fearless and uncompromising in its ambition and execution, often pushing boundaries or challenging readers’ expectations,” organisers said. Founded in 2012, the award is open to both fiction and non-fiction titles by authors resident in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States of America.

The 2019 judges, author A A Dhand, artist Gary Hume, journalist and broadcaster Miranda Sawyer, and musician Rachel Unthank, selected the shortlist and will announce the winner in October.

Dhand said: "It was a pleasure to read twelve really strong books in order to reach our shortlist of six and within it we have such a broad depth of narratives, from historical fiction dating back to the Trojan War to the very here and now and what it means to be British in a time of huge uncertainty. There are individual and community voices here, which not only deserve to be heard, but moreover need to be heard. I look forward to working with the other judges in order to select a much deserving winner."

The Gordon Burn Prize announcement will take place at Durham Book Festival, a Durham County Council festival, on 10th October. The winner will receive £5,000 and the chance to spend a month’s retreat at Gordon Burn’s cottage in the Scottish Borders.

Over the next 12 months, Faber will re-issue all of Burn's books with newly commissioned introductions.