You may have heard that John Banville won this years Man Booker prize, which ought to make Mark very happy. Apparently this is quite the “coup” according to the Guardian, who report that the voting was tied until the chairman cast his vote. I love reading about this prize as every year we get to hear about the British odds.

In other prize news, the Nobel prize for Literature should be awarded this Thursday. They’ve gone and surprised everyone by announcing it a week later than the rest of the prizes. Supposedly the controversy has to do with honoring Orhan Pamuk, but I can’t help but feel they are trying to stir up some news about the prize, which usually gets a very tepid response from the media. And a judge has stepped down, declaring giving the prize last year to Elfriede Jelinek has done “irreparable damage to all progressive forces”. Meow.