Biographers' Club Best First Biography Prize goes to Wendy Moffat
25th October 2010
Wendy Moffat has been awarded the 2010 Best First Biography Prize for E.M. Forster: A New Life.
The author was presented with the honour and her GBP 2,000 prize at an awards ceremony held by the Biographers' Club at the Langham Hotel in London.
E.M. Forster: A New Life was praised by the Biographers' Club for its 'great humanity, warmth and humour'.
'Based on a lifetime's dedication to her subject, Wendy Moffat's intelligent literary analysis sheds new light on one of Europe's leading intellectual figures,' the organisation added.
A Guardian review of the book claimed it is a 'thoroughly revisionist biography', as it successfully explores Forster's personality rather than focusing on his literary achievements.
Other biography books shortlisted for the prize included Anne Boston's Lesley Blanch, Young Romantics by Daisy Hay, Candia McWilliam's What to Look for in Winter, Storyteller by Donald Sturrock and Ion Trewin's Alan Clark.
Lady Antonia Fraser, Anne Chisholm and Roland Chambers, who won the award last year with The Last Englishman, judged the 2010 prize.