Celebrating
25 years of The Portico Prize for Literature!
This year The Portico Library is celebrating the fact that it is twenty-five
years since the first prize was awarded to Gary Messinger, in 1985,
for his book Manchester in the Victorian Age. The Portico Prize
continues to be a leading literary event. 2008 was a pivotal year for
the Prize as the boundaries were widened to include the whole of the
North of England, rather than just the North West and the prizes, reaching
£4,000, each were awarded to a work of fiction and one of non-fiction
The judges for the Portico Prize are chosen for their connection with
the region and the literary world. Once again we have been fortunate
to secure the highest quality of judges.
Gold
Dagger Award winning crime writer Val McDermid won the Portico Prize
for Fiction in 2006 with The Grave Tattoo. At the time Val said,
'I'm particularly proud to have won this prize because of its association
with the Portico which is one of the hidden gems of Manchester. It's
also gratifying that the judges were willing to consider a genre novel
for a prestigious literary prize.' Val has sold one million copies of
her books in the UK alone and over ten million worldwide and her novel
Wire in the Blood was made into a TV series.
Ed
Glinert was born in Dalston, London, however, he is an honorary Mancunian
by virtue of the fact that he was a co-founder of Manchester's City
Life. Ed is also a celebrated author whose recent Manchester
Compendium was described by The Independent as a 'superb
work of in-depth research and dry Northern wit.' Not bad for a Londoner!
Ed's latest enterprise is New Manchester Walks which offer nearly forty
walks in the city exploring the past and present, the celebrated and
the notorious.
Our
third judge, Dr Stella Butler was a graduate of the University of Manchester
and UMIST. She has been closely involved with the funding and development
of both Chetham's Library and John Rylands University Library and has
continued her career within the museums and Libraries sector. She is
now Deputy Librarian and Associate Director at the John Rylands Library,
where she has been responsible for a £15,000,000 refurbishment
project centred on the Library's Deansgate building.
I think you will agree that we are indeed fortunate to have such distinguished
judges for this year's prize!
Our
speaker for the dinner on 18th November, at Manchester Town Hall, is
music journalist, writer and broadcaster Stuart Maconie. His book Pies
and Prejudice was short-listed for the 2008 Portico Prize. In this
book he travels with humour and affection through the North. Stuart's
northern credentials are immaculate; the comedian Peter Kay famously
described him as 'The best thing to come out of Wigan since the A58
to Bolton.' Stuart is a man of many parts and in December 2009 he won
BBC's 'Celebrity Mastermind,' his specialist subject was 20th century
British Poetry. In the same month he was awarded an honorary Masters
Degree by his Alma Mater, Edge Hill University which was in recognition
of his professional success, promotion of the North West and championing
the region's talent.
The Zochonis Charitable Trust has been a sponsor of The Portico Prize
since 1995 and is again generously sponsoring both the The Portico Prize
for Literature 2010 and the newly introduced Portico Prize for Young
Writers. Sir John Zochonis, is a modest but truly great son of the North
West. When I wrote to him to ask his Charitable Trust to support both
Prizes, he promptly replied with a personal letter that pledged his
support and sponsorship. He emphasized how important he thought it was
to encourage young writers and the Library is grateful indeed for his
support.
We
are also extremely lucky to be collaborating with the Writing School
at Manchester Metropolitan University on our new venture - The Portico
Prize for Young Writers - a literary competition celebrating writing
by young people in Northern England. Kaye Tew deserves a special mention
as she has enabled us to support this prize as part of her outreach
work. Schools and colleges from across the North West of England have
nominated their Young Portico Writers, a number of whom have been selected
to attend workshops with professional writers Sherry Ashworth, Rachel
Broady and Mandy Coe, and then be mentored by MMU writing students to
produce entries for the first Portico Prize for Young Writers. Winners
in three categories - fiction, non-fiction and poetry - will be presented
with their awards at the Portico Prize dinner in November 2010. Click
here for further details.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you would like an entry
form to submit work to the Portico Prize for Literature 2010 please
click on the link.
Gold
Dagger Award winning crime writer Val McDermid won the Portico Prize
for Fiction in 2006 with The Grave Tattoo. At the time Val said,
'I'm particularly proud to have won this prize because of its association
with the Portico which is one of the hidden gems of Manchester. It's
also gratifying that the judges were willing to consider a genre novel
for a prestigious literary prize.' Val has sold one million copies of
her books in the UK alone and over ten million worldwide and her novel
Wire in the Blood was made into a TV series.
Ed
Glinert was born in Dalston, London, however, he is an honorary Mancunian
by virtue of the fact that he was a co-founder of Manchester's City
Life. Ed is also a celebrated author whose recent Manchester
Compendium was described by The Independent as a 'superb
work of in-depth research and dry Northern wit.' Not bad for a Londoner!
Ed's latest enterprise is New Manchester Walks which offer nearly forty
walks in the city exploring the past and present, the celebrated and
the notorious. 
Our
third judge, Dr Stella Butler was a graduate of the University of Manchester
and UMIST. She has been closely involved with the funding and development
of both Chetham's Library and John Rylands University Library and has
continued her career within the museums and Libraries sector. She is
now Deputy Librarian and Associate Director at the John Rylands Library,
where she has been responsible for a £15,000,000 refurbishment
project centred on the Library's Deansgate building. 
Our
speaker for the dinner on 18th November, at Manchester Town Hall, is
music journalist, writer and broadcaster Stuart Maconie. His book Pies
and Prejudice was short-listed for the 2008 Portico Prize. In this
book he travels with humour and affection through the North. Stuart's
northern credentials are immaculate; the comedian Peter Kay famously
described him as 'The best thing to come out of Wigan since the A58
to Bolton.' Stuart is a man of many parts and in December 2009 he won
BBC's 'Celebrity Mastermind,' his specialist subject was 20th century
British Poetry. In the same month he was awarded an honorary Masters
Degree by his Alma Mater, Edge Hill University which was in recognition
of his professional success, promotion of the North West and championing
the region's talent. 
