Dr Naomi Wood wins the BBC National Short Story Awards
By: Communications
Dr Naomi Wood’s ‘Comorbidities’ has been named as the winner of this year’s prestigious BBC National Short Story Awards by a judging panel that included journalist Reeta Chakrabarti and author Jessie Burton.
Dr Wood said:
“I am so thrilled that ‘Comorbidities’ has won the BBC National Short Story Award. As the best and most prestigious award for the short story in the country, of course it means a huge amount for my story to be recognised for the first time in this way. It’s also in advance of the whole collection coming out next year. It’s called This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things, and this award might just be the nicest thing to have happened to me in a long time!”
Dr Wood, who teaches Prose Fiction on both the undergraduate and Master's programmes, was one of five authors shortlisted for the prestigious award, with each author’s works read on BBC Radio 4 by a famous name in the lead up to the judging. Dr Wood’s story was performed by actor Charlotte Ritchie and can be listened to on BBC Sounds.
Speaking about her inspiration for ‘Comorbidities’, Dr Wood said:
“I guess the main thrust of ‘Comorbidities’ is how to maintain intimacy and love when you’re assailed with caring responsibilities, work, climate change, family – this supermassive cluster of 21st century anxieties and tensions. The title is drawn from the idea that you can’t escape from this cluster, and that all of these things are sort of comorbid with each other. It’s about how you tolerate that.”
Comorbidities is drawn from Dr Wood’s forthcoming debut collection, This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things (Orion, June 2024).
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