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The Orange Prize winner has just been announced. Women only.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-18267716

Isn't this sort of an insult to women by suggesting they can't compete with men? But it's the last year for the prize.

There doesn't seem to be a comparable prize for men.

Weird Jim

"Good reading is the only test of good writing"
Robertson Davies. A voice from the attic 1960

No, it's a way of addressing the fact that reviewers and award committees regularly overlook women authors. It's meant to correct an imbalance that already exists, not create a new one.

-- Erin

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Do you think it works?

Scroll down for the lit prizes and look at the dates.

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/lists/women.html

Weird Jim

"Good reading is the only test of good writing"
Robertson Davies. A voice from the attic 1960

Do I think that a separate prize for women helps to balance the fact that they've only received the Nobel Prize in Literature 12 times in more than a century? It helps.

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It helps.

IN what way? Surely it would be be better for women to push for more fairness in the traditional awards area rather than a push with the "We have an award too." method. I really think it counterproductive.

Gaimen said "We are in a period of change." Well, we've been in a period of change all my 82 years (only I don't remember the first couple). He's too young to understand that.

The change for women has been dramatic during my lifetime, but I don't intend to debate all that.


Weird Jim

"Good reading is the only test of good writing"
Robertson Davies. A voice from the attic 1960

Push for more fairness? Oh, yeah, that works. Let's all lobby The Eighteen (the members of the Academy responsible for nominating and voting on the Nobel Prize in Literature) to look at more women's work. After all, a whole ONE-SIXTH of them are women, so surely they're interested in equal representation.

Or we could push for fairness by calling out the New York Times book reviewers for reviewing more work by men -- oh, wait, Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Weiner did that.

Or we can say, "Hey, we're not going to let a bunch of men pandering to other men be the exclusive arbiters of taste." THAT is how it helps.

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