South African author Damon Galgut has won the 2021 Man Booker Prize, one of the world’s most prestigious awards, for his novel the Promise.
“Great news. I’m happy, happy, happy. Thanks!” tweeted Galgut.
Which is more than can be said about his novel, which is the story about an unhappy Afrikaner family, the Swarts, who live on a farm outside Pretoria. One by one they die, depriving the family maid of her promised inheritance – the small house that she lives in.
Galgut was the overwhelming favourite to win the award which included writers from the entire English-speaking world.
The Promise was widely praised by the critics, though the Financial Times’ William Skidelsky described it as “dark and airless”.
Skidelsy summarised what he sees as the novel’s importance: “The Swarts may be, as the narrator says, just an ordinary bunch of white South Africans.
“And yet they stand for something larger. Exploitation and appropriation; property taken and not given back; a sense of restitution always coming too late.
“Isn’t this the story, too, of modern South Africa?”
Image source: thebookerprizes.com
