Ben McNally, owner of Ben McNally Books, at his store in Toronto in 2019. He is the 15th winner of the Ivy Award, which is administered by the writing fest’s International Visitors Programme.Christopher Katsarov/(Christopher Katsarov/The Globe
Long-time bookseller Ben McNally has won the Toronto International Festival of Authors Ivy Award, given each year to a major contributor to the Canadian publishing sector.
McNally, 77, has been selling books across the festival’s home city since 1970 – at his namesake downtown shops since 2007, but also at Nicholas Hoare Books, Book City, Coles and more.
He’s the 15th winner of the award, which is administered by the writing fest’s International Visitors Programme. The program helps members of the Canadian book sector build relationships with international partners and expand the global reach of the country’s books.
McNally is also the first bookseller to win the prize, which has typically been awarded to publishing executives such as HarperCollins Canada’s Iris Tupholme, Simon & Schuster Canada’s Nicole Winstanley and Kegedonce Press’s Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm.
“It’s nice, as a bookseller, to be representing all the booksellers in the country for all that we do,” McNally said in an interview. After all, he said, the business of getting Canadian stories into the world is not strictly a top-down affair. “We really need authors, like authors need us, and we really need publishers, and publishers need us. And the general public needs us more than anybody else.”
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This has been a particularly strong year for the publishing industry’s recognition of the entrepreneurs who get books in front of Canadian readers, he added. The Giller Prize, which has undergone significant changes after a boycott earlier this decade over past sponsors’ ties to Israel’s war in Gaza, appointed an all-indie-bookseller jury this year. The jurists include Rupert McNally and Danielle McNally, his children who now run his shop’s day-to-day operations.
McNally, who has been selling books since 1970, is the first bookseller to win the prize.Supplied
Festival director Roland Gulliver said that the Ivy Award has always celebrated the people who champion Canadian publishing, and that booksellers are a key part of the sector. “Ben has been such a stalwart of the literary community,” Gulliver said. “This felt like the point to honour his work for many, many decades.”
Bookselling has undergone numerous transformations since McNally began slinging hardcovers and paperbacks fresh out of school at the turn of the seventies. Independent bookstores have struggled to survive the sector’s consolidation of power, including the amalgamation of book chains that resulted in today’s physical-store domination by Indigo Books and Music, and the subsequent encroachment of Amazon on all booksellers. Today, he says, real-estate costs only add to the difficulties for independents in Canada.
But, McNally said, “If we were not optimists, we wouldn’t be in this business in the first place.” He and other booksellers have found new ways to get voracious readers in their doors, especially with author speaking events. “In the old days, nobody thought about doing that.”
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The Professional Association of Canadian Literary Agents, in conjunction with the festival, also announced that McClelland & Stewart editorial director, fiction, Anita Chong would be named its Person of the Year. Chong acquires and edits fiction and memoir with a focus on under-represented voices, and has worked on award-winning titles such as Souvankham Thammavongsa’s How to Pronounce Knife, Michael Christie’s Greenwood and Eleanor Catton’s Birnam Wood.
The Toronto International Festival of Authors, recently separated from its long-time home at the city’s Harbourfront Centre, will run from Oct. 28 to Nov. 1 at the University of Toronto’s Victoria University. Dave Eggers, Ann-Marie MacDonald, Patrick deWitt, Vivek Shraya, Canisia Lubrin and Téa Mutonji are among this year’s participating authors.
The festival’s International Visitors Programme helps Canadian authors, publishers and agents to find buyers for books’ international rights and has run since 2008. It routinely appoints global publishing leaders as fellows to attend the festival to deepen connections with Canada’s literary scene.
The Ivy Award will be officially awarded on Oct. 28 alongside a keynote conversation between Barnes & Noble chief executive officer James Daunt and Craig Swinwood, CEO of Harlequin & HarperCollins Canada.
Editor’s note: This article was updated to refer to Anita Chong by her most recent title, editorial director, fiction, at McClelland & Stewart.