The Baillie Gifford award announces the shortlist for its one-off Winner of Winners award in celebration of its 25th anniversary. This special one-off award will crown the best work of non-fiction published over the last 25 years. The winner will receive a total of £25,000.
The shortlist was announced in March, of which six of the previous 24 winners were selected. Chair of judges Jason Cowley said that it “showcases the best of this great prize and features works of high ambition, formal innovation, and thrilling originality.”
Gender disparity is, of course, always noted in literary awards. Two-thirds of the Baillie Gifford shortlist, The Guardian writes, are male. This represents the proportion of men who have won the prize over the 24 years. Only eight were women, whereas 16 were men.
The six authors announced include Craig Brown, Wade Davis, Barbara Demick, Patrick Radden Keefe, Margaret MacMillan, and James Shapiro.
Brown’s 2020 winner One Two Three Four: The Beatles in Time dissects the British pop group and those who knew them. For the judges, Brown’s book is a “wholly original winner of the prize.”
The historical books chosen were those that left an impact. Demick’s 2010 winner Nothing to Envy: Real Lives in North Korea was chosen due to its perfect blend of personal and political histories, bringing to light previously hidden aspects of North Korean life. Davis’s Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest is described as having “narrative compulsion” in its tale of imperialist decline.
MacMillan’s Paris 1919 (originally Peacemakers) and Shapiro’s 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare won the award over a decade ago, showing how timeless their topics are: Shakespeare and the Treaty of Versailles.
The winner of winners is to be announced on 27 April during an event held in Edinburgh at the National Museum of Scotland.
Words by Georgia McInnes