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Sarah Waters makes the shortlist for the 2009 Man Booker PrizeTuesday brought the announcement of the shortlist for the Man Booker Prize and lesbian author Sarah Waters is one of the six writers in contention for the prestigious award.
Waters was chosen for her novel The Little Stranger, an engaging ghost story set in postwar England.
Two of Waters’ previous books, Fingersmith and The Night Watch, made the shortlist in 2002 and 2006, respectively, but she has yet to win. This year’s winning author will receive £50,000, along with worldwide recognition and a huge boost in sales. Even though the odds-on favorite for the Booker is Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall, The Little Stranger has sold 50% more copies than any other title on the list and has topped many book critics’ lists of must-reads. Whether Booker judges will consider popularity remains to be seen.
When Stranger was released in May, AfterEllen.com contributing writer Heather Aimee O’Neill interviewed Waters, who wanted to assure lesbian readers that she has not abandoned them, just because her latest novel has no lesbian characters: “I know for myself that we don’t have so many lesbian writers and readers, filmmakers, whatever, that we feel we can afford to lose them. I don’t in any way feel that lesbians have lost me. It’s just that this book came along and the story really grabbed me. She repeated the sentiment when she talked to The Guardian at the Hay festival and went on to discuss everything from The Little Stranger to the kind of writer she is. You can read an excerpt of The Little Stranger at Waters’ site and can hear author interviews and audio readings from all of the 2009 Booker Prize longlisted books at the Man Booker Prize site. The winner will be announced on Tuesday, October 6. I have my fingers crossed that this is Sarah Waters’ year. Have you read The Little Stranger? Do you agree with Waters that it could be considered a queer book despite the absence of lesbian characters? How does it compare to her other novels? Submitted by on September 9, 2009 - 12:00pm. |
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I finished reading The
I finished reading The Little Stranger quite recently and although it's not up there with Fingersmith for me, I did still enjoy it. It's the kind of book that doesn't lay everything out for you and it keeps you thinking about it long after you've finished.
Also, the more I read, the more I started seeing Caroline as a queer character.
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"Hey nerds! Guess who's got two thumbs, speaks limited french and hasn't cried once today? This moi!"
Haven't read it
If it doesn't have queer characters in it, it's not a queer book. However it's still a book by a gay author so we should support it.
I am kind of a wuss and ghost stories creep me out and I live alone and I can't sleep, so I probably won't read this book haha!
I liked Fingersmith the movie, maybe I should go read the book.
If it doesn't have queer
If it doesn't have queer characters in it, it's not a queer book. However it's still a book by a gay author so we should support it.
I agree with the first part but don't agree with the second part. So what if she is gay we shouldn't support any old rubbish. That said I'm sure its good but I honestly don't care enough to read it. The Night Watch was dissapointing and I can't be bothered reading something as dull as that about a bunch of straight people. I would hope that her next book will be gayer and better but I wouldn't hold out much hope. It's a shame because I adored Fingersmith and Tipping the Velvet.
The Little Stranger's queerness
I actually do think the book is "queer," to some extent. One of the characters is quite possibly queer, and it was interesting to read about a more repressed figure in a Sarah Waters novel. I also think The Little Stranger was absolutely brilliant. It was absorbing, beautifully written, and I found it to be a total page-turner. Not everyone likes the ending, but I was really impressed by her skill as a writer.
I don't think that her lesbian novels are any worse, though, than this book. It will be interesting to see if Waters wins on a 90% straight novel, as opposed to an out-and-out queer one.
www.malindalo.com
Very Queer
If it doesn't have queer characters in it, it's not a queer book. However it's still a book by a gay author so we should support it.
I completely disagree with this statement. The term "queer" applies to many other things besides people. Although I haven't read the book, and some of its characters may very well be deemed queer in some way, it already appears to me as though it is a queer book simply because of the author. The term "queer," to my understanding, is applied to something that defies typical social norms. Since Sarah Waters has largely been known as a lesbian writer, produced several novels with queer main characters and themes, and has a very large queer fan-base, this novel is deeply associated with queer culture. And even if many don't consider it to be queer at face value, aren't we queering it by discussing it on a website for lesbians and bisexuals?
Haha, I'm sorry for being so intense about this. But I find queer culture very fascinating after taking some classes on it in university. I am really interested in how other people perceive the term queer. I'm not trying to say anyone is wrong, just giving a different perspective.
I suppose
I'll be broadly disappointed if she wins for this one, since I thought The Night Watch and Fingersmith were both better books, but nevertheless good luck to her!
I'd also agree with the possibility for it as a queer book, not just because Waters is a quote/unquote "lesbian author", but also within her broader project of 'queering' historical styles and genres, opening them up to alternative readings (I kept getting Jane Eyre vibes...). She's carrying over themes from her other novels, and other 'queer' works from the period (the category of 'queer virginity' sprang to mind).
And besides, I think she knows that if the lead female showed up in a book written when this one is set (which is the style she goes by), Lit majors like me (and formerly, her) would instantly go 'ping!' ;p
curious as always
have to read it, read all the others, but I like to wait till they are out in paperback... ;-)
Good on her again. I haven't
I've always found....
Waters to be a beautiful writer, but nothing she's written about has captured me - and oh how I have tried. Same goes for Radclyff? I'd rather read a Steve King novel or Jeffery Deavers.
Also, I don't read something because it has a gay character, I don't watch something because it has a gay character, I watch/read because its GOOD. I won't limit myself by saying I will watch/read *only* things that have something to do with the lgbt community.
I support her in my own way, but my way will not be spending money on something beautifully written, that doesn't touch my soul.... that's just moi
http://theshoefitsmisscatherine.blogspot.com/?spref=fb
tJR
Sarah Waters
I bought Tipping the Velvet at second hand store not knowing it has queer storylines. I really think i'm gay after reading it :D Affinity broke my heart, and fingersmith, lovely. The little stranger certaintly will be in the checklist and the night watch... I can't wait to read her novel.
Whether the writings contains queer character or not, i'll still be reading her books.
Good for her
Good writing is good writing. Maybe she'll actually win the Booker this time.
www.SeekingSaraSummers.com
The sad reality...
This summer, dying to read a well-written book with complex lesbian characters, I went back and re-read Fingersmith. Sarah Waters is the only author I have ever read (and I was a Literature major with a concentration in Queer Lit) to authentically and seamlessly represent lesbian attitudes/issues/emotions. Reading "Tipping the Velvet" in juxtaposition with a book like The Rubyfruit Jungle is like reading The New York Times Magazine after US Weekly. She is simply a truly gifted writer that happens to have a knowledge of lesbian issues because she is queer herself. She has no agenda, and doesn't necessarily draw directly, or obviously, from life experience like most of her predecessors in lesbian literature. And as far as I know, there is no other contemporary writer that has tackled a lesbian subject matter AND received such critical acclaim. I don't believe this is necessarily a result of discrimination, just a lack of truly great lesbian writers.
I have to admit that when I read that Sarah Water's new novel was a ghost story about straight characters (save one, maybe?), I was very disappointed. This wasn't just because I have to sometimes sleep with the light on when I get scared for no reason, but also because I have been waiting for years now for Water's to write another explicitly lesbian novel.
I realize it is not her fault that she seems to be our only hope. It's just unfortunate that when she leans toward heterocentric subject matter, we have no engaging lesbian characters to read about.
If I am wrong, please let me know! I'm dying to be proven wrong.
Though there aren't any
Though there aren't any explicitly gay or lesbian characters in the book, the fact that it's a first-person narrative, and that the person who's narrating decidedly eschews certain gender norms (especially if you are used to the main characters in Waters' other novels who speaks in a similar voice as the main character here), makes it really easy to forget that the novel is about a heterosexual relationship. There were definitely times where I was convinced I was reading a lesbian novel simply because I was a woman reading a first-person account of another woman's attractiveness...written by a woman.
Then again, the book is splendid on its own merits. In my mind, nothing will top Affinity (and I know I am in the tiny minority with that one!), and this book does have its weaker moments, but I thought The Little Stranger was incredibly well-written. Like all of Waters' novels, the beginning is rather slow, but once the creepy stuff starts happening--and trust me, it is truly creepy--the book morphs into a meditation on repression, lust, class struggle, and suffering that is difficult to put down. I know that everyone wants Waters to write another amazing lesbian novel, and truth be told I do, too, but if it means her not writing anything for years and depriving the world of a great story, which is also difficult to come by, I'd rather have her tell the great story.
And about the possibly non-straight character: that's another fascinating psychological journey in and of itself. I'm getting the sense that Waters is retreating into a very psychological form of storytelling that focuses heavily on subtlety and allowing the reader to make inferences, and in this case there is a definite inference to be drawn that adds another interesting layer to the whole repression/struggle theme of the book.
"Out of the box is where I live." -Starbuck