Sir Howard Davies: Throw the book at him

Daggers have been drawn and the backbiting has begun. Ciar Byrne meets the man who is leading the judges of the Man Booker Prize, and discovers that he's not afraid to speak his mind

Next week, the Man Booker judges meet for a final dinner at Sir Howard Davies' house. It will be their last meeting before the day of the Booker Prize itself, on 16 October, when in the space of a few hours, they will be forced to come up with a winner for the most prestigious literary award in the calendar. And this time, he might even cook for them.

At their first informal dinner, Sir Howard's wife cooked. At a second gathering, they ordered food in. Sir Howard is a busy man, currently overseeing Freshers' Week at the London School of Economics, of which he is director, as well as chairing the panel of Booker judges.
Imagine the scene: Sir Howard, the actress Imogen Stubbs, Giles Foden, the obligatory contemporary novelist without a book on this year's list of entries, the poet Wendy Cope and the academic and critic Ruth Scurr, engaged in impassioned literary conversation over steaming plates of something to ward off the autumn damp.

Full story from The Independent here.