Winner of the 2019 Republic of Consciousness Prize
Shortlisted for the 2018 Goldsmiths Prize
Winner 2019 Wellcome Book Prize
Longlisted for the 2019 Rathbones Folio Prize
Murmur evokes the extraordinary life of Alan Turing, the beauty and sorrows of love, and the nature of consciousness. Winner of the 2019 Wellcome Prize and shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize.
Taking its cue from the arrest and legally enforced chemical castration of the mathematician Alan Turing, Murmur is the account of a man who responds to intolerable physical and mental stress with love, honour and a rigorous, unsentimental curiosity about the ways in which we perceive ourselves and the world.
Formally audacious, daring in its intellectual inquiry and unwaveringly humane, Will Eaves's Murmur is a rare achievement.
About the Author
Will Eaves is the author of five novels, including Murmur, and two collections of poems. Previously Arts Editor of the Times Literary Supplement, he now teaches writing at the University of Warwick. His work has appeared in the Guardian and the New Yorker and been shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award and the Encore Award. Murmur won the Republic of Consciousness Prize and the 2019 Wellcome Prize and was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize and longlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize.
Industry Reviews
A really extraordinary book, unlike any other -- MAX PORTER
The premise is startlingly ambitious: what if we could think our way into Alan Turing's dreams? . . . Scrupulous, humane, sad and strange, [Murmur] is as bracingly intelligent as it is brave * * Guardian * *
Ambitious . . . Boldly different . . . Murmur opens your mind to a different kind of novel, one that forges a dialogue between art and science, one that celebrates the wonder of human consciousness * * The Times * *
A novel forged from an immensely beautiful writing intelligence. Murmur is a fully achieved literary experiment, digging deep into all the dimensions of human consciousness, including state sanctioned savagery -- DEBORAH LEVY
Remarkable . . . Murmur's transgressive power lies at the level both of language and of structure . . . Will Eaves has achieved one of the pinnacles of novelistic endeavour: he has given deep thought to human experience, and in doing so brought to life the "self-conscious wonder" of thought itself -- Sam Byers * * Times Literary Supplement * *
Hugely impressive . . . [Murmur] will grip your mind in the very first pages, break your heart halfway through, and in the end, strangely, unexpectedly, restore your faith in human beings and their endless capacity for resilience . . . A future classic -- ELIF SHAFAK, Wellcome Book Prize chair of judges
An extraordinary exploration of dreams, consciousness, science and the future * * New Scientist, Books of the Year * *
Murmur is a fully achieved literary experiment, digging deep into all the dimensions of human consciousness -- Goldsmiths Prize judges
Endlessly rewarding, it is a shining example of the moral and imaginative possibilities of fiction -- Justine Jordan * * Guardian, Books of the Year * *
Astonishing -- GUY GUNARATNE, author of IN OUR MAD AND FURIOUS CITY
