Do we need a literary prize for women?

The Orange Prize for Fiction longlist was announced yesterday to the usual fanfare. There are some great novels on the list, such as Emma Donaghue's Booker shortlisted Room and the National Book Critics Circle award winning A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. However, there are a great deal of good books that are not on the list because they were written by men.

Founded as recently as 1996, the Orange Prize is curiously anachronistic and, in my opinion, misguided. Fiction is one of the few areas where there is no trace of a glass ceiling and women can visibly and consistently compete and better men without the additional burden of having to overcome prejudices. The most successful author in the world is a woman, the world's most famous bookclub is run by a woman and even a casual reader would probably not struggle to name 10 female authors (try naming 10 female artists with the same ease).

Rather than supporting fiction written by women I would argue that by segregating it off like this the Orange Prize is harming it. It makes it look like the Olympic 100m final, implying that women's novels can't easily compete against those by men so need a category of their own. We should be celebrating women's writing by watching women win awards where men are also competing, not awards where only women can compete.

In my opinion, the only argument in favour of the Orange Prize is the curious failure by the Booker reward women as often as it should. Since the Orange Prize was founded in 1996, the Booker has been won by women on only five occasions. It's an issue that really needs addressing, but that should be the job of the Booker judges (who may have already started to address the balance as women have won in three out of the last five years) and not require a second prize.

I think that there is room for a women's fiction prize, but that it should be awarded to books about women not by women. If the Orange Prize was awarded to the novel which made the best contribution towards issues of women's rights and feminism, regardless of the gender of its author, I would feel much more comfortable with it.