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A 91-year-old who wrote a unflinching memoir encompassing the end of her sex life, the intimacies of ageing and the prospect of death has become the oldest writer to win a British literary prize.
Diana Athill triggered an immense response from readers and critics after writing her sixth and most frank memoir, Somewhere Towards The End, dealing with thorny themes surrounding ageing such as a dwindling desire for sex and physical frailties such as sore feet.
When published in 2007, it sparked heartfelt responses at readings across the country. The Costa Book Award judges hailed it as "a perfect memoir of old age", and that it was "candid, detailed, charming, totally lacking in self-pity or sentimentality and, above all, beautifully, beautifully written".
The book is a series of interlinked essays that touch on everything from atheism to gardening and caring. Athill, a former literary editor, said its success could be due to its frank nature because for "a long time age and death were taboo subjects in this country ... I think the fact that I'm in my nineties and still compos mentis, and able to write and have a nice time, is encouraging to people. They can look at me and say, 'There is somebody who is old - which I am dreading - but there, it's not so bad'."
She admitted she had some hesitation about writing a detailed account of old age and nearly dismissed the notion as "a dreary subject". A spokeswoman for Athill said she was suffering from influenza but was "delighted" to have been selected as the biography category winner in the awards.
Athill is one of five writers who take home a 5000 ($12,770) prize for winning their category. The others were Sebastian Barry for his novel, The Secret Scripture; Michelle Magorian with her children's book, Just Henry, which she wrote after a 10-year hiatus; and two debut writers, Sadie Jones, whose first novel, The Outcast, was a best-seller, and Adam Foulds, whose debut poetry collection about the Mau Mau uprisings in Kenya is called The Broken Word.
The overall winner of the 25,000 Costa Book of the Year prize will be announced on January 27.
If Athill wins, she will be its oldest recipient.
- INDEPENDENT
