‘Astonishingly rich’ portrait of 18th-century New York scoops award for book with finest sense of place
Golden Hill, Francis Spufford’s joyous romp through 18th-century New York, has added the Royal Society of Literature’s prestigious Ondaatje prize to its growing list of accolades. Describing the novel as “an unpredictable, exhilarating, protean novel”, the judges placed Spufford’s fiction debut at the top of five titles shortlisted for the £10,000 prize, which goes to a book of fiction, nonfiction or poetry that best evokes the “spirit of a place”.
Announcing the winner, judge Henry Hutchings praised the author’s “sense of texture” and his ability “not just to reconstruct the topography of a cultural moment far from our own, but to make the details so delicious”. He added: “Golden Hill stood out as a book with an astonishingly rich understanding of place. It’s a densely woven portrait of colonial New York, teeming with vitality and humanity.”
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