Graham ROBB wins the 2008 Ondaatje Prize

LITERARY AND CULTURAL HISTORIAN Graham Robb has won the 5th Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize with his cultural study of France, The Discovery of France: A Historical Geography From the Revolution to the First World War (Picador/W.W. Norton, 2007). There’s much to savour and learn from this biography of a country we know as France: a history of the French people, folklore, language and sociology. Judge Elaine Feinstein described the book as “an elegantly written and continuously intriguing account of the landscape and legends which, in part, explain the histories of the very different regions of France.”

Past Recipients
2008 The Discovery of France / Graham Robb
2007 In the Country of Men / Hisham Matar
2006 The People’s Act of Love / James Meek
2005 The Places In Between / Rory Stewart
2004 Hearing Birds Fly / Louisa Waugh