Jon Turney pleads for its survival

Last year, the Royal Society announced it was looking for a new sponsor for its science book
prizes. But answer came there none. The 2007 awards – one for adult titles, one for children’s books – went ahead on a reduced
budget (there was champagne at the awards, but no dinner). But, having got by for a year on residual cash from its former sponsor, The Aventis Foundation, and some clever internal accounting, there is now nothing left to eke out. The Society still needs a new funding pledge if the 2008 prize is to happen.

This is a surprise all round. Book prizes are thick on the ground, with around 300 in the UK alone, but few cater at all for non-fiction.
The big prizes seem to keep big sponsors happy (Man for the Booker prize, Costa coffee taking over from Whitbread for their award). And the science prize, which has just notched up its twentieth winner, is a going concern which just needs the right funder’s name stitched into the logo. Despite reports that the popular science publishing boom has faded, entries are still strong – with new publishers appearing each year – and sales of shortlisted titles compare well with other prizes, according to the Royal Society.
So where’s the problem? Well, promoting and managing a high-profile prize – and keeping the high profile – can come expensive. The Booker winner gets £50,000,but the Man group spends £1m a year altogether on the UK prize and the new Man Booker International Prize. Prize money for the Royal Society awards totals £30,000.

Like any prize, it is also a great starting point for discussion about whether the judges got it right

Drugs company support

At the same time, the big science-based companies may be a tougher target these days. Drugs companies have been the mainstay of the science prize. The award began life as the Science Book Prize, then became the Rhone-Poulenc Prize in 1990. When the company merged with Hoechst in 2000 the name was
changed to the Aventis Prize, to match the new corporation. The final shift was to support from the modestly-endowed Aventis Foundation in 2004, though this didn’t require another name change. But it means that really just one company has been involved all along.

Everyone’s a winner

But surely promoting science books in this straightforward way is a worthy cause for someone?Everyone benefits from the body of work which has been laid down by science writers these last few decades. You could say that never has so much science been so well
explained in so many ways. The titles on offer are getting more
diverse, as well as more numerous. So if the three million people who bought Bill Bryson’s 2004 winner, A Brief History of Nearly Everything, are wondering
where to go next, the prize can help. Of course, like any prize, it is also a great starting point for discussion about whether the judges got it right. Was Daniel Gilbert’s Stumbling on Happiness, this year’s winner, really a more satisfying read than Chris Stringer’s Homo Britannicus? Did Stephen Hawking win the prize in 2002 because The Universe in a Nutshell was a good book, or for being Stephen Hawking? (My answers: no, no, and yes.)

Investing in young scientists

OK, so maybe it has not always generated the publicity enjoyed by the fiction prizes. Even the science prize’s moment of political edginess, when 2006 winner David Bodanis donated his winnings to David Kelly’s family, got surprisingly little press. But it does get support from bookshops and libraries. And the companion prize for children’s books, which involves a large panel of young readers in the judging, is equally important for furthering the cause of good science communication. As Miriam Farbey of winner Dorling Kindersley said at this year’s award event, ‘We at DK frankly don’t care who wins this prize. We just think that in the tough
commercial environment of children’s nonfiction publishing it’s fantastic to have events like this that remind us how important it is to invest in young scientists.’
All of which suggests what a shame it would be if the prize were to falter after two decades, as well as a sad comment on
science’s place in literary culture. The word is that the Royal Society have lowered their target a little for the size of the pledge which would keep the show on the road.
So – offered: one book prize. One careful owner. Good runner. Going cheap. Any takers?

Jon Turney is course leader for the MSc in Creative Non-fiction at Imperial College London, which specialises in popular science writing.