The Guardian view on business and arts: cash without a voice | Editorial

Corporate sponsorship needs to steer clear of impinging on artistic freedomsNews that investment managers the Man Group is withdrawing its sponsorship from the Booker prize after 18 years has shocked the literary world. The hedge fund’s decision to move on was linked in the press to novelist Sebastian Faulks’s negative comments about the firm last year, made on the How to Fail podcast . The Man Group, he said, are “not the sort of people who should be sponsoring literary prizes, they’re the kind of people literary figures ought to be criticising … They’re kind of the enemy”. The prize, he said, became “terribly irritating” when Man took it over; and he himself would not be prepared to take “50 big ones” from the company, in the unlikely event of its being awarded to him. Luke Ellis, the head of the Man Group, referred to these remarks at the 2018 prize ceremony, and there has been speculation that he withdrew the company’s sponsorship in a fit of umbrage.Perhaps disobliging remarks such as this do not help smooth the frequently uncomfortable relationship between art and commerce. But correlation is not causation, and the Man Group’s removal of support is, insiders insist, more to do with its changing priorities around corporate responsibility than anger at outspoken authors. Those close to the Booker say Man Group’s departure has been known for months, but that this year’s prizes – both for English-language fiction and its international award – will carry the Man name. A... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2019-02-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #corporate responsibility #english-language fiction

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