22 2GM Tuesday July 28 2020 | the times
News
Hilary Mantel could become the first
author to win a third Booker Prize after
making the long-list for a fourth time.
She won for the first two volumes in
her trilogy about the life of Thomas
Cromwell, Wolf Hall in 2009 and Bring-
ing Up the Bodies in 2012. She also made
the long-list in 2005 for Beyond Black.
She has now been included on the 13-
strong long-list for the 2020 prize for
her novel The Mirror and the Light, the
final instalment in the Tudor trilogy.
Mantel has been long-listed along-
side three other British authors, all first-
time nominees — Gabriel Krauze, for
Who They Was, Sophie Ward, for Love
and Other Thought Experiments and
Douglas Stuart, the Scottish-American
author, for Shuggie Bain.
Half of this year’s long-listed authors
have been nominated for debut novels.
Industry experts consider Mantel to
be a frontrunner for the prize for a work
described in The Times’s review as a
“triumph of imagination”. The judges
called it a “masterful exhibition of sly
dialogue and description”.
The plot starts in May 1536 and cov-
ers the height of Thomas Cromwell’s
power and his downfall. The Times re-
view said the 875-page book risked feel-
ing bloated but that Mantel created a
world that felt “so pungent and vivid”.
Margaret Busby, chairwoman of the
judging panel, said: “Each of these
books carries an impact that has earned
Mantel tipped for
third Booker prize
it a place on the long list, deserving of
wide readership.”
Gaby Wood, literary director of the
Booker Prize Foundation, said: “When
the judges had drawn up their long-list
of 13 books, one of them said: ‘Out of
interest, how many debuts are there?’
We counted. It was half the list.
“That’s an unusually high propor-
tion, and especially surprising to the
judges, who had admired many books
by established authors and regretted
having to let them go. It’s especially
heartening to know that some authors
who have launched their careers in the
midst of Covid-19 may have a chance to
reach the readers they deserve.”
Nine of the 13 authors are women.
Only three have been long-listed
before: Mantel; Anne Tyler, nominated
in 2015 for A Spool of Blue Thread and
this year for Redhead By the Side of the
Road; and Colum McCann, in 2013 for
Transatlantic and now for Apeirogon.
The list includes an Zimbabwean
author, Tsitsi Dangarembga, long-list-
ed for This Mournable Body, and an
Ethiopian-American, Maaza Mengiste,
nominated for The Shadow King.
The prize was widened to any English
language novel in 2014. Last year it
announced two winners, Margaret
Atwood and Bernardine Evaristo, the
latter the first black female winner.
The shortlist of six books will be
announced on September 15, with the
winner revealed in November.
Where are the men? & full list, Times2Kaya Burgess
F
ire services have
reported a spate
of teenagers
getting stuck in
baby swings in a
social media trend
(Charlotte Wace writes).TikTok users are
squeezing into play
equipment in the hope of
going viral. In one video
Layani Maclean, 14, is
freed from a swing with
washing-up liquid by fourfirefighters in Faringdon,
Oxfordshire. The user
who posted the video said
it had been an accident.
Greater Manchester
fire and rescue service
said it had eight calls
about copycats last week,
tweeting: “Our
firefighters save lives.
Please don’t waste their
time.” Similar incidents
were reported in Essex,
Merseyside, Bedfordshire
and the West Midlands.
The short, looping
videos of TikTok make it
suitable for comedy.
Popular videos are often
widely copied.Firefighters
take a swing
at teen craze
F i d
Layani Maclean,
14, was freed
from a swing in
Oxfordshire in
one of a host of
video clips that
have been
condemned by
rescue servicesSWNS