Marilynne Robinson wins 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction

American author Marilynne Robinson has won the fourteenth Orange Prize for Fiction with her third novel Home (Virago).

At an awards ceremony at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London, hosted by Orange Prize for Fiction Co-Founder and Honorary Director, Kate Mosse, the 2009 Chair of Judges, Fi Glover, presented the author with the £30,000 prize and the ‘Bessie’, a limited edition bronze figurine. Both are anonymously endowed.

Fi Glover, Chair of Judges, said: “A kind, wise, enriching novel, exquisitely crafted. We were unanimously agreed - it is a profound work of art.”

The Orange Prize for Fiction was set up in 1996 to celebrate and promote fiction written by women throughout the world to the widest range of readers possible. The Orange Prize is awarded to the best novel of the year written in English by a woman.

The judges for the 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction are:

Fi Glover (Chair), Broadcaster

Bidisha, Writer and Novelist

Sarah Churchwell, Journalist and Academic

Kira Cochrane, Journalist

Martha Lane Fox, Entrepreneur

Ian Smith, Head of Sponsorship, Orange UK, commented: “This year’s shortlist was wonderfully varied and international and we are delighted there has been so much support for such a powerful literature platform. But even from such an exceptional shortlist, there can only be one winner – many congratulations to Marilynne Robinson.”

Marilynne Robinson

Marilynne Robinson is the author of the novels Housekeeping (1981), chosen as one of the Observer’s 100 greatest novels of all time, received the PEN/Hemingway Award for the best first novel and was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and Gilead (2004) which won the Pulitzer and the National Book Critics Circle Award. She has also written two works of non-fiction, Mother Country and The Death of Adam, and teaches at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Home

Jack – prodigal son of the Boughton family, godson and namesake of John Ames (main protagonist of Gilead, Robinson’s last novel), gone twenty years, has returned home looking for refuge and to try to make peace with a past littered with trouble and pain. A bad boy from childhood, an alcoholic who cannot hold down a job, Jack is perpetually at odds with his surroundings and with his traditionalist father, though he remains Boughton’s most beloved child.

His sister Glory has also returned to Gilead, fleeing her own mistakes, to care for their dying father. Brilliant, loveable, wayward, Jack forges an intense new bond with Glory and engages painfully with his father and his father’s old friend, John Ames.

Previous winners of the Orange Prize are Rose Tremain for The Road Home (2008), Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie for Half of a Yellow Sun (2007), Zadie Smith for On Beauty (2006), Lionel Shriver for We Need to Talk About Kevin (2005), Andrea Levy for Small Island (2004), Valerie Martin for Property (2003), Ann Patchett for Bel Canto (2002), Kate Grenville for The Idea of Perfection (2001), Linda Grant for When I Lived in Modern Times (2000), Suzanne Berne for A Crime in the Neighbourhood (1999), Carol Shields for Larry’s Party (1998), Anne Michaels for Fugitive Pieces (1997), and Helen Dunmore for A Spell of Winter (1996).

Francesca Kay Wins 2009 Orange Award for New Writers The Orange Prize for Fiction awards ceremony also saw the announcement of the 2009 Orange Award for New Writers. Established in 2005 as part of the Orange Prize 10th year celebrations, the emphasis of the Orange Award for New Writers is on emerging talent and the evidence of future potential. Chair of Judges, Mishal Husain, presented a £10,000 bursary, provided by Arts Council England, to Francesca Kay for her novel An Equal Stillness (Weidenfeld & Nicolson).

The 2009 award ceremony took place in The Clore Ballroom of the Royal Festival Hall. Guests toasted the winner announcement at a champagne drinks reception courtesy of Taittinger.

-ENDS-

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Press Enquiries: Amanda Johnson or Naomi Li at M&C Saatchi: Tel: 020 7543 4687/0207 544 3687 or 07715 922 180/07837 252 397 Email: amanda.johnson@mcsaatchi.com or naomi.li@mcsaatchi.com

For images please visit: www.orange.co.uk/newsroom

If you would like to set up an interview with Marilynne Robinson after 4th June, please contact Susan de Soissons at Little Brown on (0) 20 7911 8069 or at susan.desoissons@littebrown.co.uk.

**Notes to Editors **

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