From the Women’s Prize Archives.

The Women’s Prize for Fiction is delighted to announce a new partnership with BAILEYS, the world’s first cream liqueur. From 2014, the Women’s Prize for Fiction will be known as the ‘Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction’ as part of a three-year partnership announced today.

Kate Mosse, Chair of the Women’s Prize for Fiction board, said, “We’re thrilled to be announcing that Baileys is the new title sponsor for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. We were delighted by the range of interest – and enjoyed meeting brands in various sectors – but in the end, the Women’s Prize for Fiction Board felt Baileys was the ideal choice as our new partners. We were impressed not only by the scale of their ambition, but also their passion for celebrating outstanding fiction by women and willingness to help in bringing the prize to ever wider audiences.”

Speaking about the partnership Syl Saller, Global Innovation Director, Diageo, said: “We are delighted to come together with a partner that shares our passion for celebrating inspirational, modern, spirited women, in a true meeting of minds, and we are very much looking forward to what the future holds.”

“The Prize has really established itself within the world of literary culture as a wonderful platform for female talent and with this partnership we are committed to celebrating spirited women and their stories, which inspire and enrich lives around the world,” Syl Saller continued.

Kate Mosse continued: “This new partnership marks the beginning of a fantastic new chapter for the Prize. It’s time now to focus on the exceptional 2013 shortlisted titles and the awards ceremony itself. We will be revealing a full programme of new activity with Baileys and our joint plans for the Prize for 2014 and beyond in the Autumn.”

The Women’s Prize for Fiction is awarded for the best novel of the year written by a woman of any nationality in the English language. Currently in its eighteenth year, the Women’s Prize for Fiction was set up to celebrate excellence, originality and accessibility in writing by women throughout the world.

Widely acknowledged to have transformed the literary landscape and to have played a major role in introducing international writing by women to new audiences worldwide, the Women’s Prize for Fiction was founded in 1996 by a group of senior figures in the publishing industry. The aim was to celebrate and promote the very best of international fiction written by women throughout the world to the widest range of male and female readers possible and to fund a range of educational, literacy and research initiatives.

Known from 1996 to 2012 as the Orange Prize for Fiction, it is the UK’s most prestigious annual book award for fiction written by a woman.

The Prize has been privately supported for 2013. Funding has been provided in the form of gifts from companies and individual donors including Bilbary, The Book People, Bob & Co, Cherie Blair, Fanny Blake, Bloomberg, Richard & Elena Bridges, Elizabeth Buchan, Christopher Foyle, Jill Green, Martha Lane Fox CBE, Lansons Communications, Joanna Trollope OBE, Sue Woodford-Hollick and others who wish to remain anonymous.

Kate Mosse added: “The Board of the Women’s Prize for Fiction is hugely grateful to our partners and to the individual donors and companies who have supported the WPF 2013 and made it possible. Thanks to their generosity, we were in the position to secure the Prize’s long term future.”

The Women’s Prize for Fiction 2013 is awarded annually for the best full novel of the year written by a woman and published in the UK. Any woman writing in English – whatever her nationality, country of residence, age or subject matter – is eligible.

The winner receives a cheque for £30,000 and a limited edition bronze figurine known as a ‘Bessie’, created and donated by the artist Grizel Niven. Both are anonymously endowed.

The Women’s Prize for Fiction 2013 will be awarded on June 5th at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London.

The shortlist for the 2013 Women’s Prize is Kate Atkinson for Life After Life (Doubleday), A.M. Homes for May We Be Forgiven (Granta), Barbara Kingsolver for Flight Behaviour (Faber & Faber), Hilary Mantel for Bring Up the Bodies (Fourth Estate), Maria Semple for Where’d You Go Bernadette (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) and Zadie Smith for NW (Hamish Hamilton).

The judges for the 2013 Women’s Prize for Fiction are Miranda Richardson, (Chair), Actor, Razia Iqbal, BBC Broadcaster and Journalist, Rachel Johnson, Author, Editor and Journalist, Jojo Moyes, Author and Natasha Walter, Feminist Writer and Human Rights Activist.