Rushdie aims for literary hat-trick as Booker marks 40th anniversary

There is little doubt that Salman Rushdie's novel, Midnight's Children, is considered one of the most important works of modern times. In 1981, the novel, which deals with the partition of India, picked up the Booker Prize. Twelve years later, it earned greater literary kudos by being selected as the Booker of Bookers, a title given to mark the prize's 25th anniversary.

And Rushdie could now score a hat-trick with the novel, which was today selected with five other works out of all 41 former Booker winning titles, competing to win the Best of the Booker prize.

The shortlisted titles, which also include Pat Barker's The Ghost Road, Peter Carey's Oscar and Lucinda, J M Coetzee's Disgrace, Nadine Gordimer's The Conservationist and J G Farrell's The Siege of Krishnapur, where chosen by a judging panel. But the overall winner will be decided by votes from the public.

William Hill has established Rushdie's book as the favourite, with Coetzee's work in second place followed by Barker's novel.

A win for Coetzee or Carey could also mean a hat-trick for either writer as they are the only two novelists to have won the Booker Prize, now known as the Man Booker Prize, twice.

The biographer Victoria Glendinning, who was on the judging panel alongside the broadcaster Mariella Frostrup and the academic John Mullan, said: "We really feel that the six novels we picked represent the best fiction-writing of the past 40 years and that each will stand the test of time. As to which of the six is the most important, and the most enjoyable – that is up to the readers to decide."

The winner will be announced at the London Literature Festival on 10 July.

Since the Booker Prize's inception in 1968, it has grown into one of the biggest and most illustrious awards in the world.

It has helped launch novelists such as Arundhati Roy and Yann Martel and confirmed the international profiles of Iris Murdoch, who won in 1978 for The Sea, The Sea, Ben Okri for The Famished Road in 1991 and Kazuo Ishiguro, who won with The Remains of the Day in 1989.

It is also famous for literary spats. Past Booker rows have included fierce in-fighting and public showdowns between both its judging panel and short-listed writers.

In 1980, Anthony Burgess irritably declared that he would only turn up to the award ceremony if his short-listed book, Earthly Powers, would win. His rival, William Golding, picked up the prize for Rites of Passage.

The prize has also been criticised for sometimes selecting the most "marketable" winners rather than the most deserving ones, while others have accused it of trading on the much-publicised controversy that surrounds the competition rather than the literature.

In 1982, the announcement that Thomas Keneally's novel Schindler's Ark had won the prize was met with disapproval by those who dismissed the book, based on the experiences of the Holocaust survivor, Poldek Pfefferberg, as verging on non-fiction.

Even Midnight's Children created a stir for its alleged "anti-Britishness" when it won the prize, and years later there was a furore over the exclusion of Mark Haddon's A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time from the short-list in 2003, (it won almost every other major book prize that year).

Jon Howells, from Waterstone's, said that while controversy may have dogged the prize, it had undoubtedly played a part in the "reading revolution" which had taken place in the past few decades.

"All except one of 40 years' worth of Booker winners are still in print, which shows how good the prize is at not just finding great books, but timeless ones as well.

"People are still seeking out these books, and that shows that the Booker can withstand the various knocks and bruises it receives from all quarters every year," he said.

To mark the prize's 40th anniversary this year, a range of events across the nation's museums and galleries are planned. The Victoria and Albert Museum is to host an exhibition exploring the visual story of the prize over the decades, from book jackets to photographs and posters, to coincide with the announcement of the 2008 shortlist in September.

The Institute of Contemporary Arts is to present a season of films beginning next month, entitled The Booker Prize at the Movies, which will include some of the 39 film adaptations of books which have been short-listed or won the prize, including Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient, starring Ralph Fiennes, Schindler's List based on Thomas Keneally's book, and Ian McEwan's Atonement, starring Keira Knightley.

Battle for Best of the Bookers

*Disgrace by J M Coetzee (1999)

This heartbreaking tale told through the eyes of an apathetic, middle-aged academic, explores a man and his country coming to terms with the horrors of their past and present in post-apartheid South Africa.

*The Ghost Road by Pat Barker (1995)

The last volume in Barker's First World War trilogy, The Ghost Road poignantly explores the inner and outer conflicts arising from class and sexuality and how these boundaries are re-asserted and dissolved on the battlefield. The story is told through the eyes of working-class, bisexual soldier Prior, fated to confront his destiny on the battlefront of France, 1918.

*Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey (1988)

Carey tells the tale of preacher's son Oscar Hopkins and heiress Lucinda Leplastrier, on board a ship bound for New South Wales towards the end of the 19th century. Drawn together through their love of gambling and fear of loneliness, they tentatively embark on a romantic affair.

*Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie (1981)

Based on events that took place before and after the partition of India in 1947, the novel is famous for its employment of the technique of magic realism, and influences from Rushdie's own childhood and exploration of this troubled, diverse continent.

*The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer (1974)

Gordimer's explores the conflict and tension between decaying and new worlds in this tale of a businessman in 1960s apartheid-South Africa, who's forced to re-assess his values and life when a body is discovered on his property.

*The Siege of Krishnapur by J G Farrell (1973)

Farrell wonderfully captures the follies of the stiff-upper-lip Brits and their assurance of their own infallibility in this satirical novel, which depicts the siege of an Indian town during the 1857 Indian Rebellion, told from the perspectives of the British, the Indian sepoys and the Indian princes.