Sci-fi Writer M. John Harrison Wins 2026 Booker Prize for Novel 'The End of Everything' About a Post-Catastrophe World
81-year-old Harrison has become the oldest Booker Prize winner in history. The award is considered the second most prestigious after the Nobel Prize.
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British science fiction writer Michael John Harrison has won the 2026 Booker Prize. The judges recognized his novel The End of Everything, which tells of a catastrophe that befell humanity, reports the BBC.
81-year-old Harrison became the oldest Booker Prize winner in history. The previous oldest laureate was Margaret Atwood, who received the award in 2019 when she was 79.
He also became the first Booker Prize laureate in history to come from the world of science fiction.
The works of the writer, who publishes under the name M. John Harrison, first began appearing in the science fiction magazine New Worlds back in the 1960s. Later, Harrison worked as the book section editor for this publication.
He has published 13 novels. Among his most famous works are the Viriconium cycle, as well as the novels Light and Nova Swing.
Although Harrison doesn't like his work to be categorized into any genres, he is called a 'titan of science fiction literature.' 'He is a truly original thinker, a writer who has shaped his own genre and who takes ideas seriously,' said Gaby Wood, head of the Booker Prize Foundation.
After receiving the award, Harrison answered questions from the ceremony attendees. Among other things, he was asked what he would like to say to readers encountering his works for the first time.
"We live in a bleak world, and it will remain bleak. There's something very strange about that," the writer replied. "But when it all ends, we might find some — I can't say hope or peace of mind — but some relief."
What They Say About the Winning Novel
The novel The End of Everything, for which Harrison received the award, is set in the near future, after an unknown catastrophe has struck the world, leading to the collapse of society.
The main characters of the novel are a man and his aunt, who live by the sea in southeast England after some catastrophic event and the arrival of mysterious alien beings on Earth.
The novel's author stated that he deliberately avoided a detailed description of the events preceding this catastrophe, so that readers would experience the same sense of disorientation as the characters in the work.
"It tells of catastrophe and apocalypse – and how, during times of catastrophe and apocalypse, it's impossible to understand what is truly happening," said this year's jury head Mary Beard during the ceremony. "But the book also contains many glimmers of optimism."
"We are lucky not to experience something similar in real life, but we tend to believe that at the moment of catastrophe, we will surely realize what is happening, see its signs, and be able to understand exactly what is occurring," Beard continued. "But Harrison says that when the catastrophe comes, you won't even understand what happened."
The British newspaper Guardian praised the book but noted that this novel 'is not for everyone,' while the New York Times concluded: 'The more we learn about life in the broken world of this novel, the harder it is to grasp.'
Literary Review described the novel as 'a work equally terrifying and possessing extraordinary beauty and tenderness.'
A Telegraph reviewer concluded that the work 'leaves the feeling that it's not reading, but a dream.'
Another Telegraph critic wrote: 'In an age when the masters of artificial intelligence systems threaten our lives, and the government recommends stocking up on canned goods and bottled water, this is, above all, a novel that can truly be called timely.'