J. M. Coetzee, seen at the University of Chicago in October 2003, has been nominated for a third Man Booker Prize.J. M. Coetzee, seen at the University of Chicago in October 2003, has been nominated for a third Man Booker Prize. (Reuters)

Past Man Booker Prize winners J.M. Coetzee and A.S. Byatt will have another crack at one of the world's most prestigious literary prizes this fall.

Both have been named to a list of 13 writers nominated for this year's £50,000 ($89,340 Cdn) award.

South Africa's Coetzee, who has won twice before, forLife & Times of Michael K in 1983 and Disgrace in 1999, has been nominated this year for Summertime.

Byatt's The Children's Book, which she launched in North America at Montreal's Blue Metropolis Festival, is also vying for the prize. British-born Byatt won in 1990 for Possession.

The other nominees are:

  • Adam Foulds, The Quickening Maze
  • Sarah Hall, How to Paint a Dead Man
  • Samantha Harvey, The Wilderness
  • James Lever, Me Cheeta
  • Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall
  • Simon Mawer, The Glass Room
  • Ed O'Loughlin, Not Untrue & Not Unkind
  • James Scudamore, Heliopolis
  • Colm Toibin, Brooklyn
  • William Trevor, Love and Summer
  • Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger

British writer Lever is making his debut with Me Cheeta, an insider's account of 1930s Hollywood told from the point of view of the chimpanzee Cheeta, who starred in the Tarzan movies.

He is one of three debut novelists on the list along with Britain's Harvey and Ireland's O'Loughlin.

There are two other Irish writers on the list — veteran novelist Trevor and previously shortlisted Toibin, who was nominated in 2004 for The Master and in 1999 for The Blackwater Lightship.

The jury considered more than 130 novels, including nine by former winners.

"This is an eclectic list, taking us from the court of Henry VIII to the Hollywood jungle, with stops along the way in a 19th-century Essex asylum, an African war zone and a futuristic Brazilian city among other places," said jury chair James Naughtie.

A shortlist of six books will be revealed on Sept. 8, and the winner will be named in October.

Aravind Adiga won the Man Booker Prize in 2008 for his debut novel The White Tiger.