Question

Read the following passage and answer the questions below:

Douglas Stuart was born in Sight hill, a housing estate in Glasgow, Scotland. He was the

youngest of three siblings. He received a bachelor's degree from the Scottish College of

Textiles and a master's degree from the Royal College of Art in London. He had no formal

education in literature and notes that while he wanted to study English literature in college, he

was discouraged from choosing the subject by a teacher who mentioned that it would "not suit

someone from his background," resulting in him subsequently studying textiles instead. He

moved to New York City at the age of 24 to begin a career in fashion design. He worked for many

brands, including Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Banana Republicand Jack Spade, for more than 20

years.Stuart balanced his writing with his design job. It is noted that he started writing his first novel

when he was balancing 12-hour shifts as a senior director of design at the Banana Republic.Before his

first novel being published, his works were featured on The New Yorker and LitHub.

His first novel, Shuggie Bain, won the 2020 Booker Prize, chosen by a judging panel

comprising Margaret Busby (chair), Lee Child, Sameer Rahim, LemnSissay, and Emily Wilson. Stuart

is the second Scottish author to win the Booker Prize in its 51-year history after it was awarded in 1994

to James Kelman for How Late It Was, How Late, which book Stuart has credited with changing his life
since it was "one of the first times he had seen his people and dialect on the page". Stuart said: "When

James won in the mid-90s, Scottish voices were seen as disruptive and outside the norm."

Shuggie Bain was also longlisted for the 2021 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in

Fiction, shortlisted for the 2020 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and was a finalist for both the

2020 Kirkus Prizeand the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. However, when Stuart wrote the

novel, responses from publishers were not as encouraging, with the book being rejected by 32 US

publishing companiesas well as a dozen in the UK, before it was finally sold to American independent

publisher Grove Atlantic, who published it in hardcover on 11 February 2020. Shuggie Bain was later

published in the United Kingdom by the Picador imprint of Pan Macmillan.

The novel received generally favourable review coverage once it was published. The book was

praised for its authentic portrayal of post-industrial working-class Glasgow of the 1980s and early

1990s, and also for his capture of the "wry, indefatigable Glaswegian voice in all its various shades of

wit, anger and hope. Speaking at the Booker Prize award ceremony, Margaret Busby, chair of the panel,

noted that the book was destined to be a classic, and went on to describe the work as a "moving,

immersive and nuanced portrait of a tight-knit social world, its people and its values.

In November 2020, Stuart revealed that he had finished his second novel, Loch Awe, also set in

mid-1990s Glasgow. The book is a love story between two young men, set against the backdrop of post-

industrial Glasgow, with its territorial gangs, and divisions across sectarian lines. In his words, the book

is about "toxic masculinity" and the violence that can stem from pressures on working-class boys to

"man-up"

1. What did Douglas wish to learn at college?

2. What is the name of Douglas Stuart’s first novel that received the 2020 Booker Prize?

3. What was the book praised for?

4. Who was the first Scottish author to win The Booker Prize?

5. Where was the second novel Loch Awe set in?​

Answer 1

Answer:

1. Douglas wish to learn English literature at college