This year’s Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction has gone to Naomi Alderman. The “Disobedience” author took home the prize — a bronze statuette called a Bessie — and £30,000 (about $38,750 USD) for her feminist sci-fi novel “The Power,” BBC News reports. The book takes place in a dystopian world “in which women have developed the ability to give electric shocks at will.”
“One of the ideas of the novel is that women — if we could be in a position to physically hurt people — would be all lovely all the time,” Alderman said in an interview with BBC News. “I think that in itself is something of a patronizing idea.” She added, “Given that women can be CEOs how did we ever end up in a position when we thought they couldn’t? The answer seemed to be to be very much tied up with violence.”
Introduced in 1996, the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction is an annual award for “the best novel of the year written in English by a female author,” BBC details. Previous winners include Helen Dunmore, Zadie Smith, Ali Smith, Lionel Shriver, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
“The women’s movement is more vital to me than any other utility that might come into my house,” Alderman emphasized as she accepted her Bessie. “The support and power of other women has been more vital to me than electricity.”
“The Power” isn’t just making waves in the literary world. According to the source, a series adaptation of Alderman’s novel is in the works at Sister Pictures (“Broadchurch”). The author is set to pen the series, which will “expand” on the novel’s storylines.
“The Lessons” and “The Liars’ Gospel” are among Alderman’s other books. She penned “Borrowed Time,” a “Doctor Who” spin-off novel in 2011 and “would love to write for ‘Doctor Who’ on the telly” as well.
A film based on Alderman’s 2006 novel “Disobedience” is expected to hit theaters later this year. Rachel Weisz and Rachel McAdams star in the story about a woman named Ronit (Weisz) who returns to her Orthodox Jewish community for her father’s funeral. She eventually enters into a romantic relationship with her childhood friend (McAdams), who happens to be married to Ronit’s cousin. “Gloria’s” Sebastian Lelio directed the project and wrote the script with Rebecca Lenkiewicz (“Ida”).
