Man groups the London based investment firm has ended its longtime sponsorship of Britain’s prestigious man booker prize for novels. The group in its international edition and other related activities has invested a total of £25million in the prize.
The decision came after Author Sebastian Faulks, who was once a judge on the prize but has never won it, last year criticized Man Group as ‘the enemy’. In the statement, he said they were ‘not the sort of people who should be sponsoring literary prizes, they’re the kind of people literary prizes ought to be criticizing’.
The Booker prize foundation trustees said that they are in talks with the new sponsor and are confident that the new funding will be placed in the year 2020.
Man Group’s chief executive, Luke Ellis, said it would ‘focus its resources’ on a new campaign to increase diversity in the industry and expand the firm’s global charitable initiatives. ‘We are truly honoured to have been a part of something so special and unique,’ he added.
The fiction prize is the UK’s most prestigious literary prize and is eligible for any novel written in English which is published in UK and Ireland.
Booker prize foundation chairwoman Helena Kennedy said “Man Group has been an excellent and very generous sponsor for nearly 18 years since 2002,’ ‘With their support we have seen the prizes and our charitable activities flourish so that today the prizes can claim to be the most significant literary awards in the world. ‘However, all good things must come to an end and we look forward to taking the prizes into the next phase with our new supporter”.
The award that was launched in 1969, was only open to novelists from Commonwealth states but in 2014, it began permitting people from other English-speaking countries also.
