R. Gapper book prize
Each year, the Society awards the prestigious R. Gapper book prize for a book in the field of French studies, published for the first time in the previous calendar year, by a scholar based in an institution of higher education in the United Kingdom or Ireland. The award commends books of critical and scholarly distinction which have a clear impact on the wider critical debate. It includes a cash prize of £2000, and expenses-paid travel to the next annual conference of the Society for French Studies. In addition, the award is publicized in French Studies, in the French Studies Bulletin, and on the Society’s website.
The award is usually made in February of each year and is presented to the winner at the annual conference of the Society for French Studies. The winner is selected by the Gapper Book Prize Jury, appointed by the SFS Executive and chaired by one of their number. Their decision is then proposed to the SFS Executive and to the R. H. Gapper Charitable Trust, who jointly award the prize. The criteria for award of the prize are, broadly, the book’s critical and scholarly distinction and its likely impact on wider critical debate. In assessing these, the following qualities will be taken into account:
- Scope and range
- Intellectual ambition
- Originality
- Coherence and persuasiveness
- Depth of scholarship
- Eloquence
2019 Entries
Entries for 2019 are now closed.
Submissions are now welcome for the R. Gapper Book Prize for the best book published in French Studies in 2018. Submissions should be sent to the Chair of the Jury, Professor Margaret Topping by 31 August 2019, at the following address:
Prof. Margaret Topping, The Graduate School, Queen’s University Belfast, Belfast, N. Ireland, UK BT7 1NN
Previous recipients
2018
The Society is delighted to announce that the R. Gapper Book Prize for the best book in French Studies published in 2017 has been awarded to Professor Julian Swann of Birkbeck College, University of London, for his monograph:
Exile, Imprisonment or Death: The Politics of Disgrace in Bourbon France, 1610-1789 (Oxford University Press)
Details of the book can be found at: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/exile-imprisonment-or-death-9780198788690?cc=gb&lang=en&
We also offer our warmest congratulations to the authors of the other shortlisted books:
Conan Fischer, A Vision of Europe: Franco-German Relations during the Great Depression, 1929-1932 (OUP)
Tom Hamilton, Pierre de L'Estoile and his World in the Wars of Religion (OUP)
Shirley Jordan, Marie Ndiaye: Inhospitable Fictions (Legenda)
Winner: Julian Swann
| Project | Exile, Imprisonment or Death: The Politics of Disgrace in Bourbon France, 1610-1789 |
|---|---|
| Institution | Birkbeck College, University of London |
| Publication | Oxford University Press |
2017
Winner: Roger Pearson
| Project | Unacknowledged Legislators: The Poet as Lawgiver in Post-Revolutionary France |
|---|---|
| Institution | The Queen's College, Oxford |
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2016 |
Runner up: Helen Swift
| Project | Representing the Dead: Epitaph Fictions in Late-Medieval France |
|---|---|
| Institution | St Hilda's College, Oxford |
| Publication | Boydell & Brewer, 2016 |
2016
Winner: Neil Kenny
| Project | Death and Tenses: Posthumous Presence in Early Modern France |
|---|---|
| Institution | University of Oxford |
| Publication | Oxford: OUP, 2015 |
Winner: Patrick McGuinness
| Project | Poetry and Radical Politics in fin de siècle France: From Anarchism to Action Française |
|---|---|
| Institution | University of Oxford |
| Publication | Oxford: OUP, 2015 |
2015
Winner: Robert Mills
| Project | Seeing Sodomy in the Middle Ages |
|---|---|
| Institution | UCL |
| Publication | University of Chicago Press, 2015 |
Runner up: Mairéad Hanrahan
| Project | Cixous’s Semi-Fictions |
|---|---|
| Institution | UCL |
| Publication | Edinburgh University Press, 2015 |
Runner up: Joseph Harris
| Project | Inventing the Spectator |
|---|---|
| Institution | Royal Holloway |
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2015 |
Runner up: Ann Jefferson
| Project | Genius in France: an Idea and its Uses |
|---|---|
| Institution | University of Oxford |
| Publication | Princeton University Press, 2015 |
2014
Winner: Christopher Prendergast
| Project | Mirages and Mad Beliefs: Proust the Skeptic |
|---|---|
| Publication | Princeton University Press, 2014 |
2013
Winner: Siân Reynolds
| Project | Marriage and Revolution: Monsieur & Madame Roland |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2013 |
2012
Winner: Michael Moriarty
| Project | Disguised Vices: Theories of Virtue in Early Modern French Thought |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2012 |
2011
Winner: Judith Still
| Project | Derrida and Hospitality: Theory and Practice |
|---|---|
| Publication | Edinburgh University Press, 2011 |
2010
Winner: Ardis Butterfield
| Project | The Familiar Enemy: Chaucer, Language and Nation in the Hundred Years War |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2010 |
2009
Winner: Alain Viala
| Project | La France galante |
|---|---|
| Publication | Presses universitaires de France, 2009 |
2008
Winner: Mark Greengrass
| Project | Governing Passions. Peace and Reform in the French Kingdom, 1576-1585 |
|---|---|
: (Oxford University Press). |
|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2008 |
Winner: Christopher Prendergast
| Project | The Classic. Sainte-Beuve and the Nineteenth-Century Culture Wars |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2008 |
2007
Winner: Eric Robertson
| Project | Arp: Painter, Poet, Sculptor |
|---|---|
| Publication | Yale University Press, 2007 |
2006
Winner: Maria C. Scott
| Project | Baudelaire’s ‘Le Spleen de Paris’ : Shifting Perspectives |
|---|---|
| Publication | Ashgate, 2006 |
2005
Winner: Roger Pearson
| Project | Mallarmé and Circumstance: The Translation of Silence |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2005 |
2004
Winner: Sylvia Huot
| Project | Madness in Medieval French Literature: Identities Lost and Found |
|---|---|
| Publication | Oxford University Press, 2004 |
Professor Margaret Topping
Dean of the Graduate School,
Queen’s University Belfast,
Belfast BT7 1NN,
Northern Ireland
Entries for 2019 are now closed.