The novels "Wolf Hall" and "Bring Up the Bodies" both already won Booker Prizes, but there's about to be another trophy bestowed upon Hilary Mantel.
The novelist is to receive the Bodley Medal at the Oxford Literary Festival; previous recipients, honored for their services to literature and communications, include Seamus Heaney and P. D. James.
The old-school honor from Britain's top university comes as Mantel faces criticism for her iconoclastic views. Her piece in the current issue of the London Review of Books describes Kate Middleton as a "shop-window mannequin," and critics including Prime Minister David Cameron stopped reading before Mantel expressed sympathy for Middleton and urged the nation to allow its Duchess independence.
With the honor from Oxford -- though those shouting her down might wish otherwise -- Mantel seems yet more entrenched as part of the British cultural landscape.
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