Julian Barnes wins Man Booker Prize 2011

London, Oct 19: British author and bookmaker's favourite Julian Barens won the 2011 Man Booker Prize, one of the highest profile awards in English-language literature, for his fiction novel 'The Sense of an Ending'.

Barens had been shortlisted three times previously for Man Booker Prize. He was earlier nominated for "Flaubert"s Parrot" in 1984, "England, England" in 1998 and "Arthur and George" in 2005.

Addressing the audience after hearing the news, he said that he was 'as much relieved as I am delighted' after losing out in 1984, 1998 and 2005.

Barnes was the bookmaker's favourite ahead of Carol Birch with 'Jamrach's Menagerie', Canadian authors Patrick deWitt and Esi Edugyan for "The Sisters Brothers" and "Half Blood Blues" and also was up against debut British novelists Stephen Kelman ("Pigeon English") and A.D. Miller's thriller 'Snowdrops'. The selected panel was chaired by the former head of Britain's domestic intelligence agency MI5, Stella Rimington.

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