Greatest Living British Author

[Motokid]

LONDON (Reuters) - JK Rowling was voted the greatest living British writer in a survey published Thursday.

The Harry Potter creator whose stories of the young wizard have sold over 300 million copies worldwide received nearly three times as many votes as Discworld author Terry Pratchett in second place.

Third in The Book Magazine poll was Ian McEwan, author of titles including "Amsterdam" and "Atonement," followed by "Satanic Verses" and "Midnight's Children" author Salman Rushdie.

Kazuo Ishiguro, who was awarded the OBE in 1995 for services to literature was fifth and Philip Pullman, author of "Northern Lights" was sixth.
Nick Hornby, whose most recent novel "A Long Way Down" was short-listed for the 2005 Whitbread Novel Award was eighth followed by AS Byatt.

Jonathan Coe was joint tenth with spy novelist John Le Carr.

The magazine suggested 45 authors' names and its readers were invited to vote online.

Gotta love this don't ya?

 

[Stewart]

FFS!

 

[beer good]

No. That didn't just happen.

 

[kirsty]

Good God Ada.

 

[Ice]

I heard this on the news this morning

 

[Kenny Shovel]

I must be missing the problem here. Any survey of this kind is going to be won by the popular and mainstream. You honestly think Rushdie would get more votes than someone who has sold 300 million books? Just discount the authors there by due of fan-base more than merit and you have the real result.

1) Ian McEwan
2) Salman Rushdie
3) Kazuo Ishiguro

Edit: My best guess if a similar poll was run in America

1) JK Rowling
2) Jesus
3) Erm, that's it

 

[Shade]

That's right. It's a popularity poll. In fact if the magazine hadn't provided the names to choose from, good writers like McEwan, Ishiguro etc wouldn't have been placed at all. It would have been Archer, Follett, Cole, etc. So let's be grateful for small mercies.

Who would others have put at the top of the list, from a completely free selection?

 

[Stewart]

I must be missing the problem here. Any kind of survey of this kind is going to be won by the popular and mainstream.

While I would expect the mainstream to triumph in this sort of poll (perhaps of Newsround viewers) I wouldn't have expected it from the readers of something called The Book Magazine, although that's probably me being naive. I've never heard of the publication so perhaps it really is a glossy glory to JK Rowling.

My best guess if a similar poll was run in America

1) JK Rowling
2) Jesus
3) Erm, that's it

 

[Shade]

Jesus was British! I knew it all along.

EDIT: Here's the magazine's website.

 

[Kenny Shovel]

Who would others have put at the top of the list, from a completely free selection?

I read hardly any contemporary fiction, but I do have a soft spot for Beryl Bainbridge.

 

[Kenny Shovel]

Jesus was British! I knew it all along.

No, I was suggesting Americans think he's American, do try and keep up...

EDIT: Here's the magazine's website.

Oooo Alan Bennett, nobody describes a macaroon as well as Alan Bennett.

 

[novella]

I can't say I've been very enthusiastic about many British writers lately. A decade or so ago I would have said Burgess and Murdoch and Graham Greene, but they're dead. I really don't think McEwan is among the best ever, Ishiguro is downright disappointing in important ways, and I'm not a Ballard or Amis person. Pat Barker is a contender, for sure, though she writes a lot of depressed men mumbling into their overcoat collars.

I think Philip Pullman is probably worth a read, but I haven't gotten there yet. Also Banville.

I'm a great fan of Le Carre, rating him far above the rest of that genre.

Are there any 'central concerns' of British writers writing now? It seems like the literary shelves in England are being taken over by postcolonial literature of displacement, like Zadie Smith, Arundhati Roy, Monica Ali, Danticat, and that type of thing.

 

[Stewart]

I thought you were a St. Aubyn fan, novella?

 

[novella]

I thought you were a St. Aubyn fan, novella?

Yes, I am indeed. Though it might be a bit soon to count him among the greats. He sure is amusing though, with the necessary dose of pathos. In the pantheon under discussion, he's perhaps one of the lesser gods.

 

[mehastings]

I think Philip Pullman is probably worth a read...

He is, but I'd hardly classify him as the "Greatest".

I would have voted for Jesus if he weren't an ignorant flag waving, gun toting, war mongering, environment ruining, self obsessed rude American like myself. (Can we tell I'm getting a tad bored with the Anti-American sentiments?)

So instead I'm going to have to go with Kazuo Ishiguro simply because I loved The Remains of the Day and am almost done with Never Let Me Go. I think he's brilliant.

 

[Kenny Shovel]

I would have voted for Jesus if he weren't an ignorant flag waving, gun toting, war mongering, environment ruining, self obsessed rude American like myself.

He's not American yet, but plans are being made....

 

[abecedarian]

Edit: My best guess if a similar poll was run in America

1) JK Rowling
2) Jesus
3) Erm, that's it

Cute, but even this ignorant American knows Jesus was neither British OR a writer

 

[Shade]

So instead I'm going to have to go with Kazuo Ishiguro simply because I loved The Remains of the Day and am almost done with Never Let Me Go. I think he's brilliant.

Yes, he is. I haven't formulated an answer to my own question back there but I wouldn't demur from Ishiguro if he were pressed upon me, so to speak. And if Updike or Roth or (formerly) Bellow was the living embodiment of the 'traditional' American writer - voluble, noisy, direct, messy, long - then Ishiguro surely is the epitome of a certain kind of Britishness (whatever you think of it): subtle, restrained, clever, and always looking to the past.

I suppose for sheer pleasure over the years Amis would have to place highly for me. Similarly Patrick McGrath or Magnus Mills, who have each only disappointed once, though they still feel like quite minor players, with only half a dozen books each.

 

[Stewart]

I suppose for sheer pleasure over the years Amis would have to place highly for me. Similarly Patrick McGrath or Magnus Mills, who have each only disappointed once, though they still feel like quite minor players, with only half a dozen books each.

How about JG Ballard?

 

[Shade]

There may well be a case for Ballard but I'm not in a strong position to judge. I've only read a few of his books (Concrete Island, The Unlimited Dream Company, Super-Cannes) and I enjoy him to an extent but he's not 100% my cup of tea. On the one hand his stuff seems eccentric enough to mark him out as a true original; on the other hand it all has certain similarities (though that could be said of most authors) - his last few novels (Super-Cannes, Cocaine Nights, Millennium People: the blurb of his new one Kingdom Come is exactly the same as Super-Cannes) seem to be almost the same book from what I hear - which suggests he's actually writing on a very narrow range, and that could weigh against.