Shortlist for Baillie Gifford Non-Fiction Prize 2023 unveiled
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
A trio of debut authors feature on the six-strong shortlist for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction 2023.
The annual literary prize will see the winner take home a £50,000 award during a ceremony on November 16 at the Science Museum in London, while the shortlisted writers receive an increased prize fund of £5,000 each.
British writer Hannah Barnes is among the debut authors featured for her profile of the NHS’s flagship gender service for children, titled Time To Think: The Inside Story Of The Collapse Of The Tavistock’s Gender Service For Children.
Chairman of the judging panel Frederick Studemann described the book as “courageous” during a press conference.
“It’s a topic that is quick to invite some pretty charged (comments), people feel very passionately about it so you have to tread respectfully and carefully and I think the author managed (that).”
US author Jeremy Eichler also features on the shortlist for his “extraordinarily ambitious” debut book Time’s Echo: The Second World War, The Holocaust, and The Music Of Remembrance, exploring the role of music in a post-Holocaust world.
Mr Studemann described first-time British writer Tania Branigan’s book titled Red Memory: Living, Remembering And Forgetting China’s Cultural Revolution as “one of the big topics of our age” which she approaches from a different angle.
He said: “There’s lots of books about how the authoritarian regime in China is doing X and how China is going to dominate these parts of global political or economic situation.
“She flips it and actually goes into China and says this legacy of the Cultural Revolution that is everywhere and yet it’s so little discussed, and it affects everyone… It really helps you understand China today.”
Meanwhile Mr Studemann described American-Canadian John Vaillant’s shortlisted book Fire Weather: A True Story From A Hotter World as a “really remarkable climate change book” that is not straightforward but extremely “pertinent”.
Australian author Christopher Clark also featured on the bill for Revolutionary Spring: Fighting For A New World 1848-1849, alongside US writer Jennifer Homans for her “remarkable” book Mr B: George Balanchine’s Twentieth Century, about the US ballet choreographer.
“To write about dance is one of the most difficult things to do in writing,” Mr Studemann said.
As part of the celebrations marking the prize’s 25th anniversary, the shortlisted authors will receive an increased prize fund of £5,000 – up from £1,000.
Last year, Katherine Rundell won the award for her modern biography documenting the many sides of poet, scholar and priest John Donne, titled Super-Infinite: The Transformations Of John Donne.
The winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction 2023 will be announced on November 16 at London’s Science Museum.
