Search Results for: The Lantern Bearers

Carnegie Medal 2014 shortlist announced | Rosemary Sutcliff won in 1959 with The Lantern Bearers and runner-up for Tristan and Iseult

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The Carnegie Medal—judged by librarians in the United Kingdom is 77 years-old, this year! Past winners have included Rosemary Sutcliff as well such classic authors of children’s literature as Arthur Ransome and  C.S. Lewis. The shortlist of eight books for 2014 has just been announced:

  1. All the Truth That’s in Me by Julie Berry (Published by Templar)
  2. The Bunker Diary by Kevin Brooks (Puffin)
  3. The Child’s Elephant by Rachel Campbell-Johnston (David Fickling Books)
  4. Ghost Hawk by Susan Cooper (Bodley Head)
  5. Blood Family by Anne Fine (Doubleday)
  6. Rooftoppers by Katherine Rundell (Faber & Faber)
  7. Liar & Spy by Rebecca Stead (Andersen Press)
  8. The Wall by William Sutcliffe (sic) (Bloomsbury)

Rosemary Sutcliff  (1920-92) won the Library Association Carnegie Medal in 1959 for her historical novel for children The Lantern Bearers (she wrote for children ‘aged 8 to 88’, she said).  She was runner-up with Tristan and Iseult in 1972.

First awarded to Arthur Ransome for Pigeon Post, the medal is now awarded by The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. The winner  receives a golden medal and  £500 worth of books to donate to a library. Both the Carnegie Medal and its sister award, the Kate Greenaway Medal for illustrated books, are awarded every year.

Originally the Library Association started the prize in 1936 in memory of the Scottish-born philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919). He was a self-made industrialist who made his fortune in the steel industry in the USA and who was a great supporter of libraries. He once said ”if ever wealth came to me that it should be used to establish free libraries”.

Rosemary Sutcliff also won or was nominated for many other awards in the UK and USA. (She won other awards in translation).

Rosemary Sutcliff’s Carnegie-medal-winning The Lantern Bearers adapted for radio by Felix Fenton (1961)

Anthony Lawton5 Comments

I recently discovered  Felix Felton (1911 – 72) who was a British actor, and a radio director and author. In 1961 he adapted Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Lantern Bearers (published in 1959) for a six-part series for Children’s Hour for BBC Radio. In 1962 he also adapted  Dawn Wind (1961) for radio, playing the role of Einon Hen himself.

Rosemary Sutcliff’s historical novel for children The Lantern Bearers won The Carnegie Medal in 1959

Anthony LawtonLeave a comment
Cover of Japanese Edition of The Lantern Bearers

Rosemary Sutcliff won the Library Association Carnegie Medal in 1959 for her historical novel for children (“aged 8 to 88” in her view) The Lantern Bearers. The Medal is awarded every year in the UK to the writer of an outstanding book for children. First awarded to Arthur Ransome for Pigeon Post, the medal is now awarded by CILIP: The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. Both the Carnegie Medal and its sister award, the Kate Greenaway Medal are awarded annually. The 2012 shortlist was recently announced, and the winners will be named on Thursday 14th June.

The Library Association started the prize in 1936, in memory of the Scottish-born philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), a self-made industrialist who made his fortune in steel in the USA. The winner now receives a golden medal and some £500 worth of books to donate to a library of their choice. Rosemary Sutcliff also won or was nominated for many other awards in the UK and USA. (She won other awards in translation). She

Full list of Carnegie Medal winners here

The Lantern Bearers | Rosemary Sutcliff novel | Maxfield Parris frontispiece

Anthony Lawton2 Comments

I discovered from a search for <The Lantern Bearers> (the title of one of Rosemary Sutcliff‘s bestselling and award-winning historical novels) that there was an American painter of distinction, Maxfield Parrish, who made a work called The Lantern Bearers.  It was created originally, in 1908, as a frontispiece for the December 10, 1910 issue of Collier’s magazine.

The Lantern Bearers (1908) by Maxfield Parrish

A press release from the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art quoted its director Don Bacigalupi in July 2010:  “The detailed representational style juxtaposed with a flat, almost medieval sky create spatial ambiguities that are most interesting. This work has a stage-set, dream-world quality that is compelling.” Hmmm…

The Lantern Bearers | Carnegie Medal winner 1957

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I sometimes think that we stand at sunset … It may be that the night will close over us in the end, but I believe that morning will come again … We are the Lantern Bearers, my friend; for us to keep something burning, to carry what light we can forward into the darkness and the wind.

More about Rosemary Sutcliff‘s award-winning historical novel The Lantern Bearers on this blog