The Bookseller Diagram Prize is awarded jointly every year by the British literary magazine The Bookseller and the London-based information and graphics company Diagram Group. As a humorous literary award, it is given to the book with the strangest title.
Highlights From the Bookseller Diagram Prize for the Oddest Book Title of the Year
As the list below of ten previous winners of the Oddest Title of the Year prize shows, no decade, country or publisher stood out particularly; there was oddness throughout. After all, among the world’s strangest book titles, one can almost select blindly and be sure to pick something really weird.
- If You Want Closure in Your Relationship, Start with Your Legs (Simon & Schuster, 2007)
- Bombproof Your Horse: Teach Your Horse to Be Confident, Obedient, and Safe, No Matter What You Encounter (J A Allen, 2004)
- Living with Crazy Buttocks (Penguin US/Australia, 2002)
- Reusing Old Graves: A Report on Popular British Attitudes (Shaw & Son, 1995)
- Highlights in the History of Concrete (British Cement Association, 1994)
- How to Shit in the Woods: An Environmentally Sound Approach to a Lost Art (Ten Speed Press, 1989)
- Oral Sadism and the Vegetarian Personality (Brunner/Mazel, 1986)
- Population and Other Problems: Family Planning, Housing 1,000 million, Labour Employment (China National Publications, 1982)
- The Madam as Entrepreneur: Career Management in House Prostitution (Transaction Press, 1979)
- Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice (University of Tokyo Press, 1978)
The History of the Odd Book Title Award
The prize for the strangest book title was organized initially to provide entertainment at the 1978 Frankfurt Book Fair. It turned into an annual event whose winner was decided by a panel of judges. Since 2000, however, the general public has voted on The Bookseller’s website for the oddest book title of the year.
For a humorous award, the organizers do take the topic quite seriously. For two years, no award was given due to a dearth of strange book titles, namely in 1987 and 1991. Last year’s winner, The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-milligram Containers of Fromage Frais (Icon Group International, 2008) even caused some controversy because it was compiled by a computer.
Influence of the Bookseller Diagram Prize
Publishers, librarians and booksellers around the world submit strange book titles they spot to The Bookseller whose team will then put together a shortlist that the general public can vote for. The winner is usually declared in March and can expect to profit from the extra publicity and a resulting sales boost.
Says Horace Bent, custodian of the Diagram Prize and The Bookseller’s diarist, about the unexpected success of the prize, now in its 31st year: “If back in 1978 a the birth of this prestigious award someone was to tell me that in 31 years time, the prize will still be going stronger than ever, I would have (unintentionally) spat champers in their face, whoever they were.”
Even though the nominations for 2009 will not be out until February 2010, now is a good time to send in suggestions. And, participating in the oddest title selection is a great chance to judge a book if not by its cover at least by its title as voters are strongly discouraged from reading any of the nominated books!
Readers of this article may also be interested in more information about the Nobel Prize in Literature, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction or UNESCO's City of Literature model.
Simone Preuss - Simone is a freelance writer, editor and translator who decided to go solo after a successful career in publishing. That was more than ...
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