20 July 2026
Curator, author and editor Andrew Renton is to chair the Wingate Literary Prize judging panel in the Prize’s 50th year. Renton will be joined by the novelist and winner of the 2025 prize Manya Wilkinson, the writer and broadcaster Viv Groskop and Rabbi Baroness Dame Julia Neuberger DBE. Now in its 50h year, the annual £4,000 prize is awarded to the best book – fiction or non-fiction – to convey the idea of Jewishness to the general reader.
As British Jewry’s most prestigious book award it attracts nominations from all over the world.
The winner of the 2026 Prize was Amir Tibon for The Gates of Gaza. Previous winners also include Nicolle Krauss, Amos Oz, Zadie Smith, Oliver Sacks, David Grossman and Linda Grant.
The prize longlist will be announced late 2026 and the winner in early 2027.
Judges’ Biographies
Viv Groskop is a writer, comedian and broadcaster. She is the author of seven books, including the international best-sellers How to Own the Room: Women and the Art of Brilliant Speaking (Penguin) and The Anna Karenina Fix: Life Lessons from Russian Literature (Penguin). She also hosts the award-winning podcast How to Own the Room (2.5 million downloads), featuring interviews with guests like Hillary Clinton, Margaret Atwood and Elif Shafak. Her memoir One Ukrainian Summer (Bonnier), about the former USSR in the 1990s, was shortlisted for the 2025 Ilse Schwepcke Prize, the biggest prize in the world for women’s travel writing. She is a member of PEN International Writers’ Circle.
Rabbi Baroness Julia Neuberger DBE is Chair of University College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and Chair of Whittington Health NHS Trust. She was Senior Rabbi of the West London Synagogue from 2011 until March 2020 and is now Rabbi Emerita. She is a cross bench Peer in the House of Lords, former Chief Executive of the King’s Fund from 1997 to 2004, and won a Harkness Fellowship to study healthcare ethics at Harvard University (1991-2).
Baroness Neuberger is a founding Trustee of the Walter and Liesel Schwab Charitable trust, set up in memory of her parents, and has recently become Patron of KRAN (Kent Refugee Action Network). She was a Trustee of the Van Leer Group Foundation and Chairman of the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. She chaired the Review of the Liverpool Care Pathway for Dying Patients in 2013 and was Vice Chair, Mental Health Act Independent Review 2017-2018. She is also a member of the Executive Board, Leo Baeck Institute London and she is a Trustee of the Rayne Foundation, she was also Chair of Independent Age and a Commissioner of the UK Commission on Bereavement. Baroness Neuberger was a also Public Voice Representative, on the Jewish Community’s BRCA Testing Programme until 2026. She is a Commissioner on the Integration of Refugees, a Trustee of Yad Hanadiv (Charitable Foundation) and Chair of the City of London Oversight Committee. She was also appointed as a Trustee of Wigmore Hall in June 2026.
Baroness Neuberger is an author and broadcaster. Her latest book on Antisemitism ‘What it is. What it isn’t. Why it matters’ (Orion Books) was published in May 2019. She is currently working on a book on pain and how we approach pain relief.
Andrew Renton is Professor of Curating at Goldsmiths, University of London. He is author and editor of many articles, books and monographs on art and wrote a weekly column for the Evening Standard on art issues. He has curated many shows internationally, included the first Manifesta biennial. He was a member of the jury for the 2006 Turner Prize. He was founding Director of Marlborough Contemporary Gallery in London. He is trustee of several organisations, including Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, The Drawing Room, The Showroom all in London and Maumaus art school in Lisbon. He has advised many collections and institutions, including the British Government Art Collection. He is co-chair of The Jewish Quarterly.
Manya Wilkinson is a New Yorker who lives in the North of England. Her latest novel ‘Lublin,’ has won The Hawthornden Prize 2025, the Wingate Prize 2025 and The Royal Society of Literature’s Encore Award 2025. Her new novel, ‘Lark,’ will be published by & Other Stories in March 2027. Formerly a senior lecturer in prose and scriptwriting on the MA for Creative Writing at Newcastle University, she currently teaches writing workshops and mentors writers. Her first novel, Ocean Avenue, was published by Serpent’s Tail. Her radio dramas have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4 Afternoon Play, Saturday Drama, Writing the Century and Woman’s Hour.