Best Novel of the Last 25 Years
Although many of the invited participants refused to have anything to do with the Observer’s vote for the best novel of the last twenty-five years, denouncing ‘list culture’ as a pact with the devil of popular culture, lists are loved in the world of websites.
Once you accept that all such lists are as official only as pronouncements made in pubs after several pints, in imperial measure, of quality beer, then they can be quite useful exercises in sparking conversation. And if you’re lucky, in sparkling conversation.
They are merely opinions, often with numbers. Unfortunately in the United States numbers and lists convey an absolutist official world, so we are saddled with the Most Valuable Player meaning somebody specific, beyond debate and beer.
Similarly we have Halls of Fame as if you are only officially very famous if people vote that you are. Why not have a Hall of Humour where you are only very funny if we vote that you are? Save us a trip to the pub. You are so funny. Yes, but only so funny - not funny enough to be in the Hall of Humour.
Or Halls of Strength, Speed, Happiness, Odour, Anger, Fertility, Honour, Agility, Health? How are you feeling today? Oh, I’m not happy. But you must be - you were voted into the Hall of Happiness years ago; we can’t vote you out; you are happy for life.
But anyway, the best novel of the last 25 years. On the eve of this year’s Booker Prize, the Observer asked 150 literary folk to vote for the best British, Irish or Commonwealth novel from 1980 to 2005. From the English-speaking world excluding the US, effectively.
And the winner is, Disgrace (1999) by South Africa’s JM Coetzee. Any Irish novelists? Recognition of John McGahern in the year of his death grows, with both Amongst Women (1990) and That They May Face the Rising Sun (2001) coming in joint eighth place.
Further down the list other Irish nominations I notice are:
• The Untouchable (1997) by John Banville
• A Long, Long Way (2005) by Sebastian Barry
• Ill Seen Ill Said (1981) by Samuel Beckett
• The Barrytown Trilogy (1987-91) by Roddy Doyle
• After You’d Gone (2000) by Maggie O’Farrell
So there.
See Also:
• Absurd Irish Celebration
• Kansas City Star Bookclub & Irish Author
• A Dublin Walking Puzzle
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