Spurling wins Walter Scott Prize

British author John Spurling has won the £25,000 (A$50,217) Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction for The Ten Thousand Things (Duckworth), reports the Bookseller. The judges described Spurling’s novel, which tells the story of painter Wang Meng during the final years of the Yuan dynasty in 14th-century China, as ‘subtle and rewarding’. ‘Through John Spurling’s writing you feel as though you are reading Wang Meng’s paintings as he created them. It is a mesmerising, elegantly drawn picture of old imperial China, which feels remarkably modern,’ said the judges. Spurling’s novel was chosen from a shortlist of seven. The Walter Scott Prize is funded by the Duke of Buccleuch, a relative of historical novelist Walter Scott, and is open to any book in English published in the previous year that is set at least 60 years prior.

Category: International news