The Wellcome Trust Book Prize 2009

[Stewart]

I received this press release recently:

The Wellcome Trust Book Prize: New Award celebrates Medicine in Literature

• First literary prize to put spotlight on health and medicine
• Jo Brand to act as Chair of judges
• £25,000 to the winning writer

What do Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera, Jean-Dominique Bauby’s The Diving Bell and the Butterfly andIan McEwan’s Saturday havein common?All three acclaimed works would have met the criteria for a major new book prize launching today.

The Wellcome Trust Book Prize is open to outstanding works of fiction and non-fiction on the theme of health, illness or medicine. The £25,000 annual award, created by the Wellcome Trust, is the first of its kind to bring together the traditionally diverse fields of medicine and literature.

Comedienne and former psychiatric nurse Jo Brand will act as Chair of the 2009 judging panel which includes BBC science journalist Quentin Cooper, Welsh poet and non-fiction writer Gwyneth Lewis, physician and author Raymond Tallis and Professor of Medicine in the Arts Brian Hurwitz.

Jo Brand says: “"Good and bad health are pretty fundamental to all our lives, so it's no surprise these themes crop up fairly often in literature too. The Wellcome Trust Book Prize recognises writers who have incorporated medicine in such a way as to really engage readers with the subject, exploring our understanding of what it means to be healthy or sick. I'm sure there are going to be plenty of wonderful books for me and the other judges to read. I just hope we can reach a final decision without too much damage to our own health."

The prize will be open to books published in the UK and works published in English translation.

A shortlist of six works will be announced at The Times Cheltenham Literature Festival in October 2009.

The winner will be announced at a prestigious ceremony in November 2009 at the Wellcome Collection in London – the Wellcome Trust’s renowned cultural venue for Medicine, Life and Art.

Clare Matterson, Director of Medicine, Society and History at the Wellcome Trust, comments: "There's always been a thirst for books that combine excellent writing with accurate and compelling medical stories.

We hope this prize will stimulate even more interest, excitement and debate about medicine and literature. Our award reflects the Wellcome Trust's aim to broaden the appeal of medicine and reach new audiences - from literature lovers to science enthusiasts alike."

Two things to note: it caters for literature in translation - good; Jo Brand is the chair of the judges; slippery decline. For those who are saying Jo Brand?! - she's a British comedienne. It looks like the prize is launching with the old celebrity endorsement thing, in much the way the Booker judges have been in decline from the days where Saul Bellow and George Steiner appeared in panels to today where rent-a-talking heads get the nod. Still, Brand does have some literary experience, which isn't all bad: she's written a couple of novels (don't know anything about them) and was on the Orange Prize's judging panel in 2005, the year that Lionel Shriver's We Need To Talk About Kevin won it.

Anyone interested can browse the prize's website. Anyone wondering what the hell a 'medicine in literature' book is can view a few examples of titles from past years that would have been eligible.