The absurdity of rewards for the dead

It is strange that, in an age when so few people read books, literary prizes have taken on such significance. This week, with considerable pomp, the Man Booker Foundation announced a new award in honour of the late Beryl Bainbridge, the novelist and Spectator contributor. At last, Beryl the ‘Booker Bridesmaid’ – so-called because she was shortlisted for the award more than any other writer without ever winning it – could become Beryl ‘the Booker bride.’ This new ‘Best of Beryl’ prize, to be chosen by the public, means she can rest in peace.

Isn’t it silly? Bainbridge deserves a posthumous prize, of course: she was a brilliant writer, arguably the best of her generation, and, I’m told, a wonderful woman. But once you start dishing out awards to the dead, where do you stop? Dickens is dead; shouldn’t he have one? What about Austen?

The real shame is not that Bainbridge never got a Booker in her lifetime, but that she is not alive to accept this ridiculous gong for being dead.