David Szalay

David Szalay
Szalay at the 2025 Edinburgh International Book Festival
Born1974 (age 51–52)
Montréal, Québec
Citizenship
  • Canada
  • Hungary
  • UK[1]
EducationSussex House School
Alma materUniversity of Oxford
Notable works
Notable awards
Children1

David Szalay (/ˈsɒlɔɪ/ SOL-oy; born January 1974) is a writer. His novels All That Man Is and Turbulence are noted for their unique narrative structure, being collections of intertwined short stories. All That Man Is was shortlisted for the 2016 Man Booker Prize and won the Gordon Burn Prize that year. His sixth novel, Flesh, won the 2025 Booker Prize.[2][3][4]

Education and early life

Szalay was born in Montreal in 1974 in a Jewish[5][6] family of a Canadian mother and a Hungarian father. His family then moved to Beirut. They were forced to leave Lebanon after the onset of the Lebanese Civil War. They then moved to London, where he attended Sussex House School.[7][8] Szalay read English at the University of Oxford where he was an undergraduate student of Brasenose College, Oxford.[9][10] After graduating, he worked at various jobs in sales in London. Szalay moved to Brussels, then to Pécs in Hungary to pursue his ambition of becoming a writer.[8]

Career

Szalay has written a number of radio dramas for the BBC.[9] His 2018 book of short stories, Turbulence, originated in a series of 15-minute programmes for BBC Radio 4. The 12 stories included in Turbulence follow different people on flights around the world, exploring the globalization of family and friendship in the 21st century.[11] He won the Betty Trask Award for his first novel, London and the South-East, along with the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize. Since then, he has written three other novels: Innocent (2009),[12] Spring (2011),[13] and Flesh (2025).[14]

A linked collection of short stories, All That Man Is,[15] was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Gordon Burn Prize in 2016.[16][17] The Spectator said that "nobody captures the super-sadness of modern Europe as well as Szalay".[18] The Observer questioned its structure and whether or not it qualifies as a novel in the traditional sense: "does it in any sense work, as Jonathan Cape wants us to believe, as a novel? Yes, there's a thematic consistency that makes this more than a collection, and Szalay even throws in the odd narrative link (the 73-year-old, it transpires, is the 17-year-old's granddad). But still, a novel? I don't think so."[19]

Szalay was included in The Daily Telegraph's 2010 list of the top 20 British writers under 40,[20] as well as the 2013 edition of the Granta Best of Young British Novelists.[21]

In 2025, Szalay's novel Flesh won the Booker Prize;[22] The first Hungarian–British author to receive the award,[23][24] Szalay said that he "wanted to write a book that stretched between Hungary and London and involved a character who was not quite at home in either place."[23] A film adaptation of Flesh was announced in November 2025, with House Productions as the producer.[25][26]

Bibliography

The categorization of his books as novels or not has sparked some debate, particularly for All That Man Is[19] and Turbulence.[27] All That Man Is comprises nine distinct stories that weave a larger thematic picture. Turbulence is a collection of twelve loosely connected stories about different people. Flesh, while episodic, more closely resembles a conventional novel centred on a single protagonist.[28][29]

Personal life

Szalay lives in Vienna, Austria, with his wife.[11]

References

  1. ^ Vorák, Anita (10 November 2025). "A magyar származású David Szalay nyerte a Booker-díjat". Karakter (in Hungarian).
  2. ^ "David Szalay's 'Flesh' Wins 2025 Booker Prize". 10 November 2025. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  3. ^ Limbong, Andrew (10 November 2025). "'Flesh' wins 2025 Booker Prize: 'We had never read anything quite like it'". NPR. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  4. ^ "David Szalay on winning the Booker Prize for his novel 'Flesh'". PBS News. 12 November 2025. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  5. ^ Wolfisz, Francine. "Jewish authors selected for Man Booker longlist". Jewish News. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  6. ^ Weinstein, Jessica (13 September 2016). "Deborah Levy and David Szalay on Man Booker shortlist". The Jewish Chronicle. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  7. ^ "About the School". Sussex House. Retrieved 3 September 2022.
  8. ^ a b Clark, Alex (8 December 2018). "David Szalay: 'I'm laughing at myself when I write about vanity and self‑absorption'". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 March 2019.
  9. ^ a b "David Szalay". Unitedagents.co.uk. Retrieved 29 October 2016.
  10. ^ "Brasenose alumnus David Szalay wins the Booker Prize 2025". Brasenose College. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  11. ^ a b Cummins, Anthony (22 February 2025). "Writer David Szalay: 'We live in an era of short attention spans – we have to work with it the best we can'". The Guardian. Retrieved 1 November 2025.
  12. ^ a b The Innocent (Vintage, 2010)
  13. ^ a b Spring (Graywolf Press, 2012)
  14. ^ "Jonathan Cape reprints 150k copies of David Szalay's Flesh the day after his 2025 Booker Prize victory". The Bookseller. Retrieved 14 November 2025.
  15. ^ a b Szalay, David (2016). All That Man Is. Graywolf Press. ISBN 9780099593690.
  16. ^ Flood, Alison; Mark Brown (13 September 2016). "Man Booker shortlist 2016: tiny Scottish imprint sees off publishing giants | Books". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 October 2016.
  17. ^ Flood, Alison (7 October 2016). "David Szalay's 'unsparing' All That Man Is wins Gordon Burn prize". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
  18. ^ Cook, Jude (16 April 2016). "All That Man Is: a novel view of masculinity". The Spectator. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
  19. ^ a b Skidelsky, William (3 April 2016). "All That Man Is by David Szalay review – tales of love and money". The Observer. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
  20. ^ Bradbury, Lorna (18 June 2010). "Are these Britain's best 20 novelists under 40?". Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 29 October 2016.
  21. ^ "Granta writers » David Szalay". granta.com. Retrieved 18 February 2024.
  22. ^ "Szalay wins Booker Prize for tortured tale of masculinity". France24. 11 November 2025.
  23. ^ a b M, Muvija (10 November 2025). "'Flesh' author David Szalay makes history with 2025 Booker Prize win". USA TODAY.
  24. ^ Stein, Lorin (Summer 2016). "Writing All That Man Is: An Exchange". The Paris Review. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  25. ^ Clarke, Stewart (12 November 2025). "David Szalay's Booker Prize-Winning Novel 'Flesh' Set For Movie Adaptation From 'Conclave' Producer House". Deadline. Retrieved 14 November 2025.
  26. ^ "Booker Prize–Winning Novel To Be Adapted for Film". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 14 November 2025.
  27. ^ "Turbulence: A Novel | BookTowne". booktowne.com. 16 July 2019. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  28. ^ Goddard, Keiran (6 March 2025). "Flesh by David Szalay review – brilliantly spare portrait of a man". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  29. ^ "Everything you need to know about Flesh by David Szalay, winner of the Booker Prize 2025 | The Booker Prizes". thebookerprizes.com. 10 November 2025. Retrieved 13 November 2025.
  30. ^ London and the South-East (U.K. edition by Vintage Books, 2009; U.S. edition by Graywolf Press, 2017
  31. ^ Szalay, David (2018). Turbulence. Jonathan Cape. ISBN 9781529111972. OCLC 1200247689.
  32. ^ Preston, Alex (3 December 2018). "Turbulence by David Szalay review – effortless prose". The Guardian. Retrieved 28 May 2024.
  33. ^ Szalay, David (2025). Flesh. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9780771078033. OCLC 1524199834.
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