#ckg2014
Okay I wimped out of posting this the other day fearing a backlash about the sentiments involved but having seen the winner of the 2014 prize, Kevin Brooks, and the recent storm as reported in The Guardian, I feel my view is not only valid but backed up. From the piece in The Guardian:
Opinions range from the belief that the prize is too heavily YA based, topics deal with issues best left to adult literature, or that the committee of librarians that choose the prize are authoritarian gatekeepers that are out of touch with the audience the books are written for.
Myself, I sympathise with the feeling that 'children should get their book prize back', and despite being a fully qualified librarian, I really feel that a book prize should be chosen by the readers. Is it so alien to think that children could identify a book of 'outstanding literary quality'? In shadowing schemes I've attended, the children's observations have often been more astute than their librarian counterparts.
Whatever the outcome of today's prize giving, I feel uncertain that it matters. Children who read will read anyway ( although, yes, it is good to point them in the direction of good books), those who do not are unlikely to be swayed by a book considered 'good for them' by a bunch of grown ups.
CILIP are unlikely to relinquish control of the Carnegie prize anytime soon and have been largely dismissive of the criticisms levied against it. So perhaps a new prize is needed? The Branson maybe? Or Patterson? Crazy billionaires step forward for your place in history please and help children to choose their own prize winners.
Okay I wimped out of posting this the other day fearing a backlash about the sentiments involved but having seen the winner of the 2014 prize, Kevin Brooks, and the recent storm as reported in The Guardian, I feel my view is not only valid but backed up. From the piece in The Guardian:
The award-winning children's author and scriptwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce and the critic Amanda Craig are the latest to attack the award – which has been made annually by librarians since 1936 – joining Telegraph reviewer Lorna Bradbury, who described the winning book as "a uniquely sickening read" which "seems to have won on shock value rather than merit".And my two penneth: Sales of the winning book will undoubtedly rocket. Feelings on the subject of the prize can be mixed however. Librarians staunchly defend it; booksellers promote it; authors either crave it or abhore it.
Opinions range from the belief that the prize is too heavily YA based, topics deal with issues best left to adult literature, or that the committee of librarians that choose the prize are authoritarian gatekeepers that are out of touch with the audience the books are written for.
Myself, I sympathise with the feeling that 'children should get their book prize back', and despite being a fully qualified librarian, I really feel that a book prize should be chosen by the readers. Is it so alien to think that children could identify a book of 'outstanding literary quality'? In shadowing schemes I've attended, the children's observations have often been more astute than their librarian counterparts.
Whatever the outcome of today's prize giving, I feel uncertain that it matters. Children who read will read anyway ( although, yes, it is good to point them in the direction of good books), those who do not are unlikely to be swayed by a book considered 'good for them' by a bunch of grown ups.
CILIP are unlikely to relinquish control of the Carnegie prize anytime soon and have been largely dismissive of the criticisms levied against it. So perhaps a new prize is needed? The Branson maybe? Or Patterson? Crazy billionaires step forward for your place in history please and help children to choose their own prize winners.
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