The Canadian-Hungarian-British author delivers a masterwork of restraint, exploring what it means to inhabit the body in an age of disconnection.

David Szalay, the Canadian-Hungarian-British novelist celebrated for his sharp psychological insight and understated prose, has been awarded the Booker Prize for Fiction 2025 for his novel Flesh. The announcement, made at a glittering ceremony in London, marks a defining moment in contemporary literature, as Szalay becomes the first Hungarian-British author to claim the prestigious award.

A Stark and Singular Work

Published by Jonathan Cape, Flesh is Szalay’s sixth novel — a compact yet powerful exploration of the body, intimacy, and detachment in the modern world. The book follows István, a Hungarian man whose life journey from adolescence to middle age spans Budapest to London, tracing his uneasy relationship with desire, class, and the fading sense of connection in an increasingly disembodied society.

Chair of judges Roddy Doyle described Flesh as “singular and startling,” adding that the panel had “never read anything quite like it.” He praised Szalay’s courage to strip the narrative to its bare bones, allowing silences and absences to speak louder than dialogue. “The book uses space as meaning — it’s a masterclass in restraint,” Doyle said.

The Art of the Unsaid

Szalay’s Flesh follows István, a Hungarian man whose life unfolds across Budapest, London, and Vienna — cities that shimmer with affluence and alienation in equal measure. Through him, Szalay excavates the uneasy link between desire and detachment, class and craving, body and absence. The novel, spare and unsentimental, resists the psychological sprawl of modern fiction. It moves with the precision of a scalpel — cutting close to skin, rarely diving deep into thought, yet leaving the reader to bleed empathy in the spaces between sentences.

A Life Across Borders

Born in Montréal in 1974 to a Canadian mother and a Hungarian father, Szalay grew up in England and studied at Oxford before living in Budapest and now Vienna. His multinational existence — Canadian, Hungarian, British — is not just biographical trivia but an emotional map for his fiction.

From All That Man Is (shortlisted for the 2016 Booker) to Turbulence (2019), Szalay has been drawn to men adrift — professionals, dreamers, drifters — negotiating intimacy and identity in a fluid, post-national Europe. In Flesh, that theme finds its purest, most physical expression.

The Minimalist Moment

In a year crowded with maximalist storytelling, Flesh feels like a whisper that cuts through noise. Its prose is clinical yet tender, its narrative structure stripped of ornament. The result is unsettlingly intimate — a portrait of loneliness so precise it feels invasive. This Booker win also signals a literary mood: a hunger for novels that dare to understate, that allow silence to signify depth. In that sense, Szalay’s victory is not just personal — it’s a quiet revolution.

Beyond Borders, Beyond Words

In the global literary landscape, Szalay now occupies a fascinating place — a writer who straddles national identities, linguistic traditions, and philosophical impulses. His work bridges Europe and North America, realism and abstraction, speech and silence. As Flesh begins its second life in the hands of new readers worldwide, one thing is certain: David Szalay has mastered the art of saying less to reveal more. His prose may be spare, but its afterglow lingers — visceral, haunting, and profoundly human.

Pic Credit: The Booker Prizes