... is the greatest living British writer? The Book Magazine wants your vote: Who's the Greatest?
Of those already on the ballot I would pick either A.S. Byatt or Muriel Spark. But I nominated someone not on the list: William Nicholson, whose The Society of Others I reviewed last year and thought simply splendid, and whose new one, The Trial of True Love, I have just begun and am already intrigued by.
In connection with this, Dave Lull sends the following:
"I think the great literary critic F R Leavis, writing in The GreatTradition in 1948, gave as good a definition as any of what it takes to be a literary great: 'The few really great - the major novelists ... are significant in terms of the human awareness they promote; awareness of the possibilities of life.' "
Would that others would correct themselves so swiftly and thoroughly. Thanks, Dave.
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