The Long Song
by Andrea Levy
Award History
| Award | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction | 2011 | Winner |
| Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction | 2010 | Shortlist |
About This Book
Andrea Levy's fifth novel is set in Jamaica before and during the Baptist War of 1831 and the emancipation of slaves, narrated by July, a mixed-race house slave on a sugar plantation. Written with fierce ironic intelligence, the novel excavates the violence of plantation life and the precarious freedoms of emancipation. It was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction in 2011.
About the Author
Andrea Levy (1956–2019) was a British novelist of Jamaican heritage born in London, the daughter of one of the first Windrush immigrants. Her novels include Every Light in the House Burnin' (1994), Never Far from Nowhere (1996), Fruit of the Lemon (1999), and Small Island (2004), which won the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Whitbread Novel Award, the Orange Prize of Prizes, and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize. The Long Song (2010), set in Jamaica during the Baptist War of 1831 and the era of emancipation, follows July, a mixed-race house slave on a sugar plantation, narrated with fierce irony and a subversive meta-fictional frame. Read more →
