Booker Prize Bindings
 
Each year the authors short listed for the prestigious Mann Booker Literary Prize are presented
with an individually designed binding of their work, these are some I have created.
 
 

 

'Narcopolis'
2012
by Jeet Thyal
 

The novel begins and ends with the word Bombay and consequently the concept of circularity. I wanted to use different layers to create a tactile foundation which moves out in concentric forms from the city shich is the hub. I have extended these themes to the doublures and painted the edges to create a whole which emulates the alternate state of the drug user.

The design is created in sections and covered at different levels with goatskin, pigskin and calf. These skins are dyed using batik, crequelle and tying techniques. The doublures are tie-dyed pigskin, endpapers Korean handmade, black tooling, edges decorated with coloured pencil and ink, endbands of vellum and silver thread.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
'In a Strange Room'
2010

by Damon Galgut 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

'Sea of Poppies'

2008

by Amitav Ghosh 
 
 
A diverse group of characters are thrown together on an old slave sailing ship. The black tooling uses rigging as a frame for the inlaid area, which also makes reference to the characters’ lives crossing and interacting.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
'The Good Doctor'

2006

by Damon Galgut
 
 
 
 
'The Secret River'
2004 
by Kate Grenville
 
 
Water is the driving force for the imagery of this design, coupled with the influence of Aboriginal art.   A tie-dyed pigskin emulates the murky green-grey Thames, the spine and board edges coloured s strong ochre chosen to relate to Aboriginal art and in blood-red on the front the course of the Thames, the Hawkesbury on the back.
 
 
 
 
'Atonement'
2002
by Ian McEwan
 
 
The design is constructed from triangles – the A of the title and from circles which begin and end in the same place as does the narrative.  The triangle on the back features the natural landscape of the English country house, where the story is set, the front the intervening war, underlying emotions, life and knowledge.  

A rising figure bursts through reflecting the central theme – coming to terms with the past and moving on.
 
 
 
 
 

'English Passengers'

2000

by Matthew Kneale
 
 
 
 
'The Restraint of Beasts'

1998

by Magnus Mills
 
 
 
 
'Last Orders'

1996

by Graham Swift
 
 
 


'Knowledge of Angels'

1994

by Jill Patton-Walsh
 
 
 
 

'The English Patient'
1992

by Michael Ondajji
 
 
Coloured vellum was chosen, burnt skin, which is overlaid with the hopscotch game played by the nurse late at night and also redolent of the cracked flagstones which are contrasted with areas of black the overall effect resonant of the war-damaged Italian villa.