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Author Douglas Stuart at the Booker Prize online award ceremony: "Daring, terrifying and life-changing"
Photo: David Parry / AP
The British Booker Literature Prize this year goes to the Scottish native Douglas Stuart for his first novel "Shuggie Bain".
It is based on the author's childhood and is set in Glasgow in the 1980s.
Douglas tells the story of a boy who has an impoverished, alcoholic mother.
The novel was "daring, terrifying and life-changing," said jury chairwoman Margaret Busby on Thursday evening at the online ceremony in London.
"I've always wanted to be a writer, so a dream comes true," said Stuart, who watched the awards ceremony on Thursday night in London because of the corona pandemic via video broadcast.
"That changed my whole life."
"Shuggie Bain" is set in Stuart's hometown Glasgow in the 1980s and tells the story of a lonely boy in search of his own identity.
Against the backdrop of the city marked by poverty and economic crisis, Stuart depicts the relationship between the boy and his alcoholic mother in a gripping and painful way.
"My mother is in every page of this book"
Douglas Stuart at the Booker Prize award ceremony
Douglas Stuart, 44, grew up in Glasgow himself before moving to New York to work in the fashion industry.
Following the announcement, Stuart, who has lived in the United States since 2000, said, "My mother is in every page of this book and without her I and the book wouldn't be here."
The Booker Prize, established in 1969, honors the best English-language novel each year.
The winner receives prize money equivalent to 55,000 euros.
This year, four young women were among the six authors on the shortlist.
The British newspaper "The Guardian" described the shortlist as more diverse than ever before, as four of the nominees are black.
Several of them come from the USA, but have very different roots.
Last year, the Booker Literature Prize went to two authors for once.
The awards went to the Briton Bernardine Evaristo and the Canadian Margaret Atwood.
Evaristo received the award for her book "Girl, Woman, Other", Atwood for the novel "The Testaments".
In fact, the rules have forbidden sharing the UK's most important literary prize for about 25 years.
The jury could not agree on one of the two works.
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