Women's Prize for Fiction ‘greatest honour' as an intersex woman, says winner

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Women's Prize for Fiction 'greatest honour' as an intersex woman, says winner
Dutch author Yael van der Wouden won the accolade for her debut novel, The Safekeep
(left to right) Yael van der Wouden, Rachel Kushner, Anne Michaels, Queen Camilla, Charlotte Wood, Percival Everett, and Samantha Harvey during a reception for the Booker Prize Foundation at Clarence House, London
(Image: Aaron Chown/PA Wire )
The winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction has said the award is "the greatest honour of my life as a woman" as she reflected on her experience growing up intersex.
Dutch author Yael van der Wouden won the accolade for her debut novel, The Safekeep, and used her winner's speech to champion the trans community, who have "changed the system" and "fought for health care".
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The book, which explores repressed desire and the unresolved aftermath of the Holocaust in post-Second World War Netherlands, was described as an "astonishing debut" by the head of the judges.
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The ceremony, held in central London on Thursday, saw the non-fiction prize awarded to physician Dr Rachel Clarke for The Story Of A Heart, which explores the human experience behind organ donation.
In her winner's speech, after thanking the judges, van der Wouden said: "I was a girl until I turned 13, and then, as I hit puberty, all that was supposed to happen did not quite happen.
"And if it did happen, it happened too much, and all at once my girlhood became an uncertain fact.
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"I won't thrill you too much with the specifics, but the long and the short of it is that, hormonally, I'm intersex.
"This little fact defined my life throughout my teens, until I advocated for the health care that I needed.
"The surgery and the hormones that I needed, which not all intersex people need. Not all intersex people feel at odds with their gender presentation.
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"I mention the fact that I did, because in the few precious moments here on stage, I am receiving, truly, the greatest honour of my life as a woman, presenting to you as a woman, and accepting this Women's Prize.
"And that is because of every single trans person who's fought for health care, who changed the system, the law, societal standards, themselves. I stand on their shoulders."
The NHS website says intersex, or differences in sex development (DSD), is a group of rare conditions involving genes, hormones and reproductive organs that mean a person's sex development is different to most.
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In contrast, people who are transgender identify as a gender separate to the sex they were born in and sometimes go through gender-affirming surgery.
Van der Wouden's novel follows Isabel, a young woman whose life in solitude is upended when her brother's girlfriend Eva comes to live in their family house in what turns into a summer of obsession, suspicion and desire.
The chairwoman of the judges for the fiction prize, writer Kit de Waal, said: "This astonishing debut is a classic in the making, a story to be loved and appreciated for generations to come. Books like this don't come along every day."
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Van der Wouden will receive £30,000 and a limited-edition bronze statuette known as the Bessie, which was created and donated by artist Grizel Niven.
The judging panel for the Women's Prize for Fiction included novelist and journalist Diana Evans, author and journalist Bryony Gordon, writer and magazine editor Deborah Joseph, and musician and composer Amelia Warner.
Clarke said she has "literally been a feminist since I was too young to know what that word even meant", as she collected her award.
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The physician's book recounts two family stories, documenting how medical staff take care of nine-year-old Kiera in her final hours after a car accident, while offering a new life to nine-year-old Max who is suffering from heart failure from a viral infection.
Clarke, who is behind the books Breathtaking and Your Life In My Hands: A Junior Doctor's Story, will receive £30,000 and a limited-edition piece of art known as the Charlotte, both gifted by the Charlotte Aitken Trust.
The judging panel for the non-fiction prize included writer and broadcaster Dr Leah Broad, whose work focuses on women's cultural history, and novelist and critic Elizabeth Buchan.
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Previous winners of the fiction prize include Tayari Jones for An American Marriage and Madeline Miller for The Song Of Achilles, while the first non-fiction prize was awarded last year to Naomi Klein for Doppelganger: A Trip Into The Mirror World.
The awards were announced by the Women's Prize Trust, a UK charity that aims to "create equitable opportunities for women in the world of books and beyond".