Novelist Julian Barnes has been honoured with a major award for a lifetime’s achievement in literature.
The writer, whose novels include Flaubert’s Parrot and Arthur and George, was given the £40,000 David Cohen Prize for Literature at a ceremony at the British Library in London.
He said: “The measure of a literary award’s value lies in its list of previous winners. Over the last 18 years the David Cohen Prize has established itself as the greatest honour a British or Irish writer can receive within these islands.
“It is also conducted with proper secrecy and dignity. So it is a matter of sober delight to be added to the list of prize-winners.”
Previous winners include Harold Pinter, William Trevor and Doris Lessing.
Chairman of the judges Mark Lawson said: “The David Cohen Prize is in effect a UK version of the Nobel Prize for Literature, open to writers of fiction and non-fiction, comedy and tragedy.
“Within those divisions, there are writers who are most efficient at prose or dialogue, structure or style, narrative or character, plot or ideas, novels or short stories.
“What is remarkable about Julian Barnes is that he has excelled in all these areas: from the combination of literary criticism and fiction in Flaubert’s Parrot, through the structural daring of the multiple narratives in A History Of The World In 10½ Chapters to the historical faction of Arthur and George and the essayistic reflection on faith and mortality in Nothing To Be Frightened Of.”
Leicester-born Barnes, who worked as a television reviewer and was literary editor of the New Statesman, has been nominated three times for the Man Booker prize.
It is traditional that the winner of the David Cohen Prize also chooses the recipient of the Clarissa Luard Award, which is worth £12,500.
Mr Barnes presented the 2011 award to The Reading Agency to support its reading initiatives for young offenders.
He said: “It seems to me that the practice of reading is currently more under threat than the practice of writing.
“There will always be young writers; will there always be young readers?
“Our literacy levels are falling, and – disgracefully – public libraries are threatened with closure. So the Clarissa Luard Award is to go to The Reading Agency, which since 2002 has had remarkable success in promoting reading skills and confidence among the young. They work through libraries and other institutions.
“I have asked them to apply the award to their work in young offenders’ institutions, where an estimated 25 per cent of inmates have the reading age of a seven-year-old.
“They are going to run a special programme for the two years of the prize, targeting 10 Young Offenders’ Institutions across the country.”