Douglas Stuart (writer)

Douglas Stuart (born 31 May 1976) is a Scottish-American writer and fashion designer. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, he studied at the Scottish College of Textiles and London's Royal College of Art, before moving at the age of 24 to New York City, where he built a successful career in fashion design, while also beginning to write. His debut novel, Shuggie Bain – which had initially been turned down by many publishers on both sides of the Atlantic – was awarded the 2020 Booker Prize. His second novel, Young Mungo, was published in April 2022.

Douglas Stuart was born in 1976 in Sighthill, a housing estate in Glasgow, Scotland. He was the youngest of three siblings. His father left him and his family when Stuart was young, and he was raised by a single mother who was battling alcoholism and addiction. His mother died from alcoholism-related health issues when he was 16. Subsequently, when he went on to write his debut Booker Prize-winning novel, Shuggie Bain, the book would be inspired by his struggles, his mother's struggles as she battled alcoholism and his relationship with his mother. Speaking about his mother, he says: "My mother died very quietly of addiction one day." After his mother's death, he lived with his older brother before moving into a boarding house when he was 17.

Writing on Literary Hub about working-class living in the late 1970s and 1980s, Stuart notes that he grew up in a house without books and surrounded by poverty. This was the time when Thatcher-era economic policies had "decimated the working man", moving industry away from the west coast of Scotland, leaving behind mass unemployment, alcoholism, and drug abuse.

He received a bachelor's degree from the Scottish College of Textiles (now Heriot-Watt University) and a master's degree from the Royal College of Art in London. He had no formal education in literature, and notes that while he wanted to study English literature in college, he was discouraged from choosing the subject by a teacher who mentioned that it would "not suit someone from his background", resulting in Stuart subsequently studying textiles instead.

Stuart moved to New York City at the age of 24 to begin a career in fashion design. He worked for many brands, including Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Banana Republic and Jack Spade, for more than 20 years. Stuart secretly started to write his first novel while he was balancing 12-hour shifts as a senior director of design at Banana Republic.

Prior to his first novel being published, Stuart's works were featured in The New Yorker and Literary Hub.

His first novel, Shuggie Bain, won the 2020 Booker Prize, chosen by a judging panel comprising Margaret Busby (chair), Lee Child, Sameer Rahim, Lemn Sissay, and Emily Wilson. Stuart became the second Scottish author to win the Booker Prize in its 51-year history, after it was awarded in 1994 to James Kelman for How Late It Was, How Late, a book Stuart has credited with changing his life, since it was "one of the first times he had seen his people and dialect on the page". Stuart said: "When James won in the mid-90s, Scottish voices were seen as disruptive and outside the norm."

Shuggie Bain was also longlisted for the 2021 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, shortlisted for the 2020 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and was a finalist for both the 2020 Kirkus Prize and the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. However, when Stuart wrote the novel, responses from publishers were not encouraging, with the book being rejected by 32 US publishing companies (as well as by a dozen in the UK), before it was finally sold to American independent publisher Grove Atlantic, who published it in hardcover on 11 February 2020. Shuggie Bain was later published in the United Kingdom by the Picador imprint of Pan Macmillan. As of April 2022, Shuggie Bain has sold more than 1.5 million copies globally.