Last month, a reformed Glaswegian gang member, a former personal trainer and a Booker prize winner all glammed up for a photoshoot. Graeme Armstrong, Derek Owusu and Eleanor Catton had never met before, but along with 17 other writers under the age of 40, they have been decreed the “Best of Young British Novelists” by the literary magazine Granta.
A selection of 20 authors every 10 years, the Granta list has become a barometer of the literary climate and a forecast of the stars of the future. The latest cohort join a roll call of literary giants from the particularly stellar 1983 list that included Martin Amis, Pat Barker, Julian Barnes, Kazuo Ishiguro, Ian McEwan and Salman Rushdie; followed by, among others, Hanif Kureishi and Jeanette Winterson (1993); Zadie Smith, Sarah Waters and David Mitchell (2003); and Kamila Shamsie and Sarah Hall (2013). As the list itself turns 40, it seems a timely moment to reflect on its influence and relevance: who’s in, who’s out – and what that says about the literary world.
