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Booker Prize won by South African writer Damon Galgut for The Promise
South African novelist and playwright Damon Galgut has won the Booker Prize for his novel The Promise, a multi-generational, multi-voice saga set in Pretoria, that starts in 1986 with a promise made by a white South African family to their black housekeeper — and follows the fallout of this moment across 40 years.
The 57-year-old, who has been shortlisted twice previously, won the 50,000-pound ($91,783) prize against a shortlist that included Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Powers (Bewilderment; The Overstory), and which was notably young — with four of the six authors 40 years old or younger.
- Dee Jefferson
- ABC News
Chair of the judging panel Maya Jasanoff described The Promise as “a book that is a real master of …