HISTORICAL EVENTS: Gorbachev — Reagan summit.
1987
AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Enigma of Arrival.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Morrison: Beloved.
Levi: The Drowned and the Saved.
1988
LITERARY CONTEXT: Rushdie: The Satanic Verses.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Gorbachev announces big troop reductions. Benazir Bhutto Prime Minister of Pakistan.
1989
AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Turn in the South.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Márquez: The General in his Labyrinth.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe. Fall of the Berlin Wall. Tiananmen Square massacre in China.
1990
AUTHOR’S LIFE: India: A Million Mutinies Now. Knighthood for Services to Literature.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Updike: Rabbit at Rest.
Walcott: Omeros.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Nelson Mandela released from jail after 27 years’ imprisonment. German reunification. John Major becomes Prime Minister in UK. Attempted coup by Islamic fundamentalists in Trinidad.
1991
LITERARY CONTEXT: M. Amis: Time’s Arrow.
Okri: The Famished Road.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Gulf War. Yeltsin President of Russia. USSR disbanded.
1992
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Bill Clinton elected US President. Civil war in former Yugoslavia.
1993
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Wins the first David Cohen Prize for Literature.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Israel hands over West Bank and Jericho to Palestinians. Storming of White House, Moscow.
1994
AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Way in the World.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Heller: Closing Time.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Mandela and ANC sweep to victory in South African elections. Rwandan massacres. Russian military action against Chechen republic.
1996
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Wife Patricia Naipaul dies (3 February); marries Nadira Khannum Alvi (15 April).
LITERARY CONTEXT: Márquez: News of a Kidnapping.
1997
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Letters.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Bellow: The Actual.
Roth: American Pastoral.
Roy: The God of Small Things.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Tony Blair elected Prime Minister in UK (first Labour government since 1979). Princess Diana is killed in a car accident in Paris.
1998
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Beyond Belief.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Morrison: Paradise.
Pamuk: My Name is Red.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Northern Ireland Referendum accepts the Good Friday Agreement. Clinton orders air strikes against Iraq.
1999
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Between Father and Son: Family Letters.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Coetzee: Disgrace.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Serbs attack ethnic Albanians in Kosovo; US leads NATO in bombing of Belgrade.
2000
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Reading and Writing: A Personal Account.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Ishiguro: When We Were Orphans.
Smith: White Teeth.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Milosevic’s regime in the former Yugoslavia collapses. George W. Bush is elected President of the US. Putin becomes Russian President. Palestinian intifadah.
2001
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Half a Life; Nobel Prize.
LITERARY CONTEXT: McEwan: Atonement.
Franzen: The Corrections.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Al-Qaeda terrorist attacks of 9/11. US and allied military action against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
2002
AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Writer and the World: Essays.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Marteclass="underline" Life of Pi.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Guantanamo Bay detention camps established by Bush administration.
2003
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Literary Occasions: Essays.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Atwood: Oryx and Crake.
Adichie: Purple Hibiscus.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Iraq weapons crisis. American and British troops invade Iraq. Civil war in Dafur.
2004
AUTHOR’S LIFE: Magic Seeds.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Munro: Runaway.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Terrorist bombings in Madrid. Beslan school hostage crisis. Ten countries join the European Union. Indian Ocean tsunami.
2005
LITERARY CONTEXT: Banville: The Sea.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Terrorist bombings of 7/7 in London. Major earthquake in Pakistan. Death of Pope John Paul II.
2006
LITERARY CONTEXT: Kiran Desai: The Inheritance of Loss.
Murakami: Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Iran announces that it has joined the nuclear club. Conflict between Israeli and Hezbollah forces in South Lebanon. Saddam Hussein hanged.
2007
AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Writer’s People: Ways of Looking and Feeling.
LITERARY CONTEXT: Hosseini: A Thousand Splendid Suns.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Gordon Brown succeeds Tony Blair as Labour Prime Minister in UK. Benazir Bhutto assassinated. Anti-government demonstrations in Burma.
2008
LITERARY CONTEXT: Pamuk: The Museum of Innocence.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Largest global recession since Great Depression begins. Barack Obama becomes first African-American to be elected US President.
2009
LITERARY CONTEXT: Manteclass="underline" Wolf Hall.
Byatt: The Children’s Book.
HISTORICAL EVENTS: Israel invades Gaza. Defeat of Tamil Tigers ends 26 years of civil war in Sri Lanka.