Booker 2026 Judges Announced
International Service of Iran Book News Agency (IBNA) – Elaheh Shams: With the announcement of this lineup, the process of selecting next year’s flagship Booker novel has officially begun. The presence of Mary Beard as chair of the jury draws special attention to the relationship between contemporary literature, history, and mythology; a field where Beard has been a leading authority for years.
Alongside Beard and Cocker, Patricia Lockwood, novelist, Raymond Antrobus, poet, and Rebecca Liu, writer, critic and editor for Guardian Saturday, are the other members of this jury; a combination that encompasses fiction and poetry to music and cultural journalism.
In a friendly yet frank tone, Beard said that while she is “incredibly excited” to be on the panel, she also feels some anxiety because she is a “relatively slow reader” and “must learn to speed up a bit.”
Gaby Wood, CEO of the Booker Prize Foundation, described Beard’s selection as consistent with the nature of the prize itself, saying: “Much of contemporary fiction is based on history or inspired by mythology. This is why Booker judges often ask: ‘What is the novel’s relationship with the past? What does imagination do with reality?'” According to Wood, these questions make the presence of a well-known and popular classicist like Beard meaningful to lead the jury.
The Booker Prize 2026 will welcome English-language novels from authors of any nationality; works published within the specified period in the UK or Ireland. The jury will eventually announce first a longlist known as the “Booker Dozen” (12 or 13 books) and then a shortlist of six books. The final winner will receive £50,000, and each shortlisted author will receive £2,500.
Wood called the judges a “stellar group” and emphasized that each member “has a different feeling for language and words” and “has made a unique contribution to contemporary culture.”
Jarvis Cocker, who founded Pulp in high school in 1978 and whose band later became an icon of 1990s music, previously published the collection of song lyrics *Mother, Brother, Lover* in 2011. His memoir, *Good Pop, Bad Pop*, also came to market in 2022.
Mary Beard has written numerous books on ancient world history, including *Pompeii*, *SPQR*, and *Emperor of Rome*, which have cemented her reputation beyond academia in the public sphere.
Among the other judges, Patricia Lockwood was previously shortlisted for the Booker for her novel *No One Is Talking About This* and won the Dylan Thomas Prize. Raymond Antrobus is known for poetry collections such as *The Perseverance* and *Can Bears Ski?*, and Rebecca Liu has collaborated with prominent authors for years as a critic and interviewer.
In the last cycle, the Booker Prize 2025 went to David Sully for his novel *Flesh*; a selection made under a jury chaired by Roddy Doyle and including Sarah Jessica Parker.
Source: Guardian, Thu 11 Dec 2025
