Richard Flanagan, who won the Booker Prize for fiction in 2014, has become the first author in history to achieve the “unprecedented double” after being named the winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize for non-fiction.
Australian Flanagan secured the non-fiction award for his memoir Question 7, about the choices we make about love and the chain reaction that follows, which was announced at a ceremony hosted at BMA House in London on Tuesday.
It comes a decade after he won the Booker Prize with his novel The Narrow Road To The Deep North – making him the first author to have earned both honours.
Isabel Hilton, chair of judges, said: “Question 7 is an astonishingly accomplished meditation on memory, history, trauma, love and death – and an intricately woven exploration of the chains of consequence that frame a life.
“In a year rich in remarkable books, Richard Flanagan’s Question 7 spoke to the judges for its outstanding literary qualities and its profound humanity.
“This compelling memoir ranges from intimate human relations to an unflinching examination of the horrors of the 20th century, reflecting on unanswerable questions that we must keep asking.”
Flanagan beat British shortlisted authors Rachel Clarke, for heart transplant story The Story Of A Heart, and Sue Prideaux’s artist biography Wild Thing: A Life Of Paul Gauguin to win the prize.
Other shortlisted titles were Annie Jacobsen’s Nuclear War: A Scenario; Viet Thanh Nguyen’s A Man Of Two Faces: A Memoir, A History, A Memorial and David Van Reybrouck Revolusi: Indonesia And The Birth Of The Modern World – with each author receiving a £5,000 prize.
Flanagan will receive £50,000 for winning the Baillie Gifford Prize, which recognises and rewards the best of non-fiction.
Toby Mundy, prize director, said: “In winning the Baillie Gifford Prize 2024 with Question 7, Richard Flanagan has achieved an unprecedented double.
“No author has ever won both this prize and the Booker Prize for fiction.
“It is a staggering achievement, which confirms Richard Flanagan as one of the world’s most significant literary writers.”
The judges selected the winner from 349 books published between November 1 2023 and October 31 2024.
