Recent Awards for Our Authors

Congratulations to the following writers,
whose works have received notable distinctions:

Jericho Brown has been named a 2024 MacArthur Fellow. The MacArthur Fellowship is an $800,000, no-strings-attached award to extraordinarily talented and creative individuals as an investment in their potential. Brown’s poetry collection The Tradition won the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. The Pulitzer committee called the work “a collection of masterful lyrics that combine delicacy with historical urgency in their loving evocation of bodies vulnerable to hostility and violence.” He also received the 2020 Lambda Literary Trustee Award, given annually to an extraordinary individual who has broken new ground in the field of LGBTQ literature and culture. Read his poem “The Tradition” in our Library.

Li-Young Lee has been awarded the 2024 Ruth Lily Poetry Prize, granted annually to a living US poet in recognition of outstanding lifetime achievement. The prize also carries an award of $100,000. Read Lee’s poem “The Invention of the Darling” in our Library.

Jayne Anne Phillips has been awarded the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her novel Night Watch. Pulitzer judges praised the work as “epic, enthralling, and meticulously crafted,” and further noted it amounts to “a stunning chronicle of surviving war and its aftermath.” Read “Sharpshooter,” an excerpt from Night Watch, in our Library.

Lorrie Moore has been awarded the 2023 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction for her novel I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home. NBCC Fiction Chair David Varno praised the novel as “a heartbreaking and hilarious ghost story about what it means to be human in a world infected by, as Moore puts it, ‘voluntary insanity.’ ” Read Moore’s short story “How to Talk to Your Mother” in our Library.

Tryphena L. Yeboah’s story “The Dishwashing Women” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2024. More of Yeboah’s fiction and nonfiction are available in our Library.

Ada Limón has been named the Twenty-Fourth Poet Laureate of the United States for 2022–2023. “Ada Limón is a poet who connects,” said Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. “Her accessible, engaging poems ground us in where we are and who we share our world with. They speak of intimate truths, of the beauty and heartbreak that is living, in ways that help us move forward.” Read Limón’s poem “A New National Anthem” in our Library.

Ellen Bass has been named a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. The Academy of American Poets’ Board of Chancellors was established in 1946 and is an honorary group of esteemed poets who consult with the organization on artistic matters and serve as ambassadors of poetry in the world at large. Bass was also awarded a 2021 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in Poetry. A number of Bass’s poems are available in our Library.

Morgan Talty’s short story collection, Night of the Living Rez, has been awarded the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection. The prize is given to a debut collection of short stories that represents distinguished literary achievement and suggests great promise for future work. It also carries an award of $25,000. The collection has also been awarded the National Book Critics Circle 2022 John Leonard Prize for the best first book in any genre, the 2022 Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction, which carries an award of $5,000, the 2023 Maine Book Award for Fiction, as well as the 2022 New England Book Award. Many of the stories in Night of the Living Rez first appeared in Narrative and garnered Talty the 2021 Narrative Prize for best work by a new or emerging writer published in the magazine that year.

Gail Godwin’s memoir “The Desperate Place” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2023. More of Godwin’s fiction and nonfiction, as well as diaries, handwritten manuscript pages, and interviews with the author, are available in Narrative’s Library.

Daniel Mason’s story “The Toll” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2023. Mason has also previously received the 2020 Joyce Carol Oates Prize from the Simpson Literary Project. The $50,000 award honors a mid-career author of fiction who has earned a distinguished reputation and the widespread approbation and gratitude of readers. More of Mason’s fiction, as well as an interview with the author, are available in our Library.

Kirstin Valdez Quade, winner of the 2013 Narrative Prize, has won the 2022 Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters for her novel The Five Wounds. The award carries a $10,000 prize and is given to a young writer of considerable literary talent for a work published in the previous year. The Five Wounds also won The Center for Fiction 2021 First Novel Prize, with a $15,000 award. An excerpt from the novel was originally published in Narrative, and more of Quade’s fiction and nonfiction is available in our Library.

Yoon Choi’s story collection Skinship has received the 2022 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for best debut story collection. The $25,000 prize is given to an author whose debut collection of short stories represents distinguished literary achievement and suggests great promise for future work. Two of Choi’s stories, including “The Church of Abundant Life”—the first story in Skinship—originally appeared in Narrative and are available in our Library.

Diane Seuss’s poetry collection frank: sonnets has been awarded the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. The Pulitzer Committee called the book “a virtuosic collection that inventively expands the sonnet form to confront the messy contradictions of contemporary America.” Seuss also won the 2021 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry as well as the 2022 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry Collection. Seuss’s poem “Am I Supposed to Know the Difference between Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry? I Don’t.” is available in our Library.

Catherine Raven’s nonfiction work Fox & I has won the 2022 PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Award for “a work that exemplifies literary excellence on the subject of the physical or biological sciences and communicates complex scientific concepts to a lay audience.” The award comes with a $10,000 prize. Raven’s nature essay “Top Drama Will Be Renewed for Another Season” is available in our Library.

Natasha Ayaz’s short short story “Little White Birds” has been selected for the Best Small Fictions anthology, 2022. More of Ayaz’s work available in our Library.

Ifeoma Sesiana Amobi’s story “A Small Blip on an Eternal Timeline” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2022. You can read the story in our Library.

Natalie Diaz, winner of the 2012 Narrative Prize, has been awarded the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. The Pulitzer Committee called Diaz’s book Postcolonial Love Poem “a collection of tender, heart-wrenching and defiant poems that explore what it means to love and be loved in an America beset by conflict.” Diaz was also a 2018 MacArthur Fellow. Her poetry and fiction can be found in our Library.

Kevin A. González, winner of the 2011 Narrative Prize, has been named a 2021 Creative Nonfiction Grantee by the Whiting Foundation. In awarding the $40,000 grant, the jury wrote, “González’s voice grabs you by the collar, as funny and combative in its critique of imperialism as it is sympathetic and wise in its portraits of the author’s family.” González’s fiction can be found in our Library.

Louise Glück has been awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature. In giving the award to Glück, the Nobel Committee cited her “unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal.” Glück’s other honors include the Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award, and a National Humanities Medal, presented by President Barack Obama. Her poem “Terminal Resemblance” can be found in our Library.

Austin Smith’s story “Late Rumspringa” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2021. Smith’s poetry and fiction, including “The Halverson Brothers,” for which he won the 2014 Narrative Prize, can be found in our Library.

Raven Leilani’s novel Luster has won the National Book Critics Circle 2021 John Leonard Award for the best first book in any genre. The award, established in 2013, has also been given to Narrative Prize winners Anthony Marra and Kirstin Valdez Quade. Leilani was also named a 2020 “5 Under 35” honoree by the National Book Foundation, and Luster received the 2020 Kirkus Prize, with its $50,000 award. Leilani was the winner of Narrative’s Ninth Annual Poetry Contest, and her poems can be found in our Library.

Valzhyna Mort has won the 2021 Griffin International Poetry Prize for her collection Music for the Dead and Resurrected. The award carries a C$65,000 prize and is the world’s largest international prize for a first-edition single collection of poetry written in or translated into English. Mort’s poetry can be found in our Library.

Ladan Osman has received a 2021 Whiting Award. The $50,000 awards are based on early accomplishment and the promise of great work to come. In giving the award to Osman, the Whiting selection committee wrote, “Ladan Osman’s dazzling and incisive poetry creates vibrant connections between generations of women, between the self and history, and between our bodies and the natural world.” Osman’s poetry can be found in our Library.

Jennifer Huang has won the 2021 Ballard Spahr Prize for Poetry for their collection Return Flight. The award carries a $10,000 prize. Huang’s poem “Nonconcordant” can be found in our Library.

Kwame Dawes has been awarded the 2021 biennial PEN/Nora Magid Award for his editorship of Prairie Schooner. The award recognizes an editor whose high literary standards and tastes have contributed to the excellence of the publication they edit. Dawes also received a 2019 Windham Campbell Prize. The $150,000 prize calls attention to literary achievement and provides writers with the opportunity to focus on their work independent of financial concerns. Dawes’s poetry can be found in our Library.

Joyce Carol Oates has won the 2020 Prix mondial Cino Del Duca, which is worth 200,000 euros. The French award recognises an author whose work constitutes a message of modern humanism. Oates also won the 2017 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the category of mystery/thriller for her novel A Book of American Martyrs. An excerpt from the novel was originally published in Narrative, as was Oates’s memoir “The Lost Sister: An Elegy,” selected for the Best American Essays, 2016. More of Oates’s work is available in our Library.

Alice Hoffman has won the 2020 Dayton Literary Peace Prize for her novel The World That We Knew. The award, which carries a $10,000 prize, recognizes the power of the written word to promote peace. Work by Hoffman can be found in our Library.

Aria Aber has received a 2020 Whiting Award. The $50,000 awards are based on early accomplishment and the promise of great work to come. Aber’s poetry can be found in our Library.

Ocean Vuong, winner of the 2015 Narrative Prize, has been named a 2019 MacArthur Fellow. The MacArthur Fellowship is a $625,000, no-strings-attached award to extraordinarily talented and creative individuals as an investment in their potential. Vuong also won a 2020 American Book Award, recognizing outstanding literary achievement from the entire spectrum of America’s diverse literary community. A number of Vuong’s poems, as well as an interview with the author, are available in Narrative’s Library.

Lisa Cupolo has won the 2020 W. S. Porter Prize for her story collection Have Mercy on Us. Three of the collection’s stories were originally published in Narrative and are available in our Library.

Richard Bausch’s story “In That Time” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2020. More than a dozen selections by Bausch, who has previously been honored with the Rea Award for his contributions to the discipline of the short story form, are available in Narrative’s Library.

Cally Fiedorek’s story “In The Arms of Saturday Night” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2020. More of Fiedorek’s work can be found in our Library.

Hal Crowther’s essay “Dante on Broadway” has been selected for the Pushcart Prize series, 2020. Crowther’s essay “Christian Soldiers” was selected the previous year for the Pushcart Prize series, 2019, and received notable mention in the Best American Essays, 2018. His essay collection Freedom Fighters and Hell Raisers: A Gallery of Memorable Southerners was the winner of the 2019 IPPY Gold Medal in Essay/Creative Nonfiction. More of Crowther’s nonfiction is available in our Library.

Saidiya Hartman, winner of the 2007 Narrative Prize, has won the 2019 National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism for Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments. The National Book Critics Circle honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism, and literature. Hartman was also named a 2019 MacArthur Fellow. An excerpt from Hartman’s memoir Lose Your Mother: A Journal Along the Atlantic Slave Route is available in Narrative’s Library.

Anthony Marra, winner of the 2012 Narrative Prize, has won the $50,000 Simpson Family Literary Prize (2018), a collaboration of the Lafayette Library and Learning Center Foundation and the University of California at Berkeley English department. Marra also received the 2016 American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Rosenthal Family Foundation Award in Literature for his story collection The Tsar of Love and Techno. The collection included the stories “Granddaughters” and “The Palace of the People,” which first appeared in Narrative. Marra won the $4,000 Narrative Prize after his first published story, “Chechnya,” appeared in Narrative, followed by several other stories and an essay.

Learn about more awards for Narrative authors, here.