ThePulitzer Prize for Fiction is one of the seven AmericanPulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Letters, Drama, and Music. It recognizes distinguished fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life, published during the preceding calendar year.[citation needed]
As thePulitzer Prize for the Novel (awarded 1918–1947), it was one of the original Pulitzers; the program wasinaugurated in 1917 with seven prizes, four of which were awarded that year[1] (no Novel prize was awarded in 1917, the first one having been granted in 1918).[2]
The name was changed to thePulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1948, and eligibility was expanded to also includeshort stories,novellas,novelettes, and poetry, as well as novels.[citation needed]
Finalists have been announced since 1980, usually a total of three.[2]
As defined in the original Plan of Award, the prize was given "Annually, for the American novel published during the year which shall best present the wholesome atmosphere of American life, and the highest standard of American manners and manhood," although there was some struggle over whether the wordwholesome should be used instead ofwhole, the word Pulitzer had written in his will.[3] In 1927, the advisory board quietly instituted Pulitzer's word choice, replacingwholesome withwhole.
A new consideration arose when the Pulitzer jury was unanimous in recommendingThornton Wilder'sThe Bridge of San Luis Rey for the 1928 prize, although the book deals with Peruvians inPeru, not with Americans in America. The jury chair, Richard Burton ofColumbia University, emphasized themoral value of the book in his report to the advisory board: "This piece of fiction is not only an admirable example of literary skill in the art of fiction, but also possesses a philosophic import and a spiritual elevation which greatly increases its literary value."Robert Morss Lovett disagreed, saying it would be "mere subterfuge to say that it has anything to do with the highest standard of American manners and manhood," but went along with the jury in finding "less literary merit" in the other novels under discussion. (Lovett rejected the runner-upBlack April byJulia Peterkin, calling it "a rather unedifying picture of life in a primitive negro community" and "an ironical answer to the terms on which the prize is offered." Peterkin won nevertheless in 1929 for a similar novel,Scarlet Sister Mary.) Having settled onBridge, the Advisory Board redefined the conditions from "whole atmosphere of American life, and the highest standard of American manners and manhood" to "preferably one which shall best present the whole atmosphere of American life," although this did not address the novel's setting.[4] Further refinement into "the best novel published that year by an American author" removed any impediment toPearl S. Buck'sThe Good Earth in 1932, also with a foreign setting in its study of Chinese village life inAnhui,East China.[5]
With 1929 came the first of several much more substantive changes. The board changed the wording to "preferably one which shall best present the whole atmosphere of American life" and deleted the insistence that the novel portray "the highest standard of American manners and manhood". In 1936, emphasis was changed again, with the award going to "a distinguished novel published during the year by an American author, preferably dealing with American life". In 1948, the advisory board widened the scope of the award with the wording "For distinguished fiction published in book form during the year by an American author, preferably dealing with American life."[3] This change allowed the prize to go to a collection of short stories for the first time, James Michener'sTales of the South Pacific.
In 31 years under the "Novel" name, the prize was awarded 27 times; in its first 76 years to 2024 under the "Fiction" name, 70 times. There have been 11 years during which no title received the award. It was shared by two authors for the first time in 2023.[2] Since this category's inception in 1918, 31 women have won the prize. Four authors have won two prizes each in the Fiction category:Booth Tarkington,William Faulkner,John Updike, andColson Whitehead.
Because the award is for books published in the preceding calendar year, the "Year" column links to the preceding year in literature.
Four writers to date have won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction multiple times, one nominally in the novel category and two in the general fiction category.Ernest Hemingway was selected by the 1941 and 1953 juries, but the former was overturned with no award given that year.[r]
^The 1918 jury gave honorable mention toBromley Neighborhood byAlice Brown.[6]
^In 1920, first-time fiction juror Stuart P. Sherman initially recommendedJava Head byJoseph Hergesheimer for the award; he rescinded his recommendation when the other jurors informed him that the word "whole" in a key phrase of the original description of the award, "the whole atmosphere of American life", had subsequently been changed to "wholesome".[7]
^JurorRobert Morss Lovett wrote in the June 22, 1921 issue ofThe New Republic that in fact the jury had preferredMain Street by Sinclair Lewis. The Pulitzer board overturned their decision. The man with the deciding vote may have beenNicholas Murray Butler. Lovett thought the public had a right to know that the jury had chosen another book. Lewis was angry but wrote her a congratulatory note. Wharton wrote back, "When I discovered that I was being rewarded — by one of our leading Universities — for uplifting American morals, I confess I did despair. Subsequently, when I found the prize shd really have been yours, but was withdrawn because your book (I quote from memory) had 'offended a number of prominent persons in the Middle West,' disgust was added to despair."
^Advisory Board secretaryFrank D. Fackenthal asked the jurors only to "list the books in the order of the jury's choice without indicating the ins and outs of the vote." Their report said that they had also "favorably considered"Shadows on the Rock byWilla Cather andThe Lady Who Came to Stay by R.E. Spencer, noting "it's a rare year when three such excellent novels appear."[5]
^The 1934 jury was not unanimous, but recommendedA Watch in the Night byHelen C. White as their "majority choice", withLamb in His Bosom byCaroline Miller a "close second" andNo More Sea byWilson Follett a "good third." The Advisory Board namedLamb in His Bosom as the winner.[16]
^ThoughApartment in Athens byGlenway Wescott,The Wayfarers byDan Wickenden, andBlack Boy byRichard Wright were each championed by at least one juror, the jury as a whole could not reach a consensus; one point of contention overBlack Boy specifically was that the book is a memoir, not a novel.[7]
^The two-man fiction jury could not agree on a single book to recommend to the Advisory Board, so no award was given; among the books recommended by juror Eric P. Kelly wereRamey byJack D. Ferris,The Sands of Karakorum byJames Ullman,The Adventures of Augie March bySaul Bellow, andThe Four Lives of Mundy Tolliver byBen Lucien Burman, while juror Harris F. Fletcher recommendedThe Street of the Three Friends byMyron Brinig andThe Deep Sleep byWright Morris[7]
^The fiction jury had recommended the 1957 award toElizabeth Spencer'sThe Voice at the Back Door, but the Pulitzer board, which has sole discretion for awarding the prize, made no award.
^"Among the books the judges most seriously considered were the following: (1)Norman Fruchter'sCoat Upon a Stick…, (2)May Sarton's novellaJoanna and Ulysses…, (3)Sumner Locke Elliott'sCareful, He Might Hear You…, [and] (4)John Killens'And Then We Heard the Thunder… If a prize were to be awarded for a 1963 novel we felt these to be the most serious candidates." However, the fiction jury ultimately recommended that no award be given because "no one of them imposes itself upon us as demanding recognition as 'distinguished fiction'…."[7]
^The fiction jury had unanimously recommended the 1974 award toThomas Pynchon'sGravity's Rainbow, but the Pulitzer board, which has sole discretion for awarding the prize, made no award.[22]
^The fiction jury had recommended the 1977 award toNorman MacLean'sA River Runs Through It, but the Pulitzer board, which has sole discretion for awarding the prize, made no award. That same year, however,Alex Haley's iconicfamily sagaRoots was awarded a special Pulitzer Prize.[22]
^"A collection of 13 short stories set in small-town Maine that packs a cumulative emotional wallop, bound together by polished prose and by Olive, the title character, blunt, flawed and fascinating."[24]
^"A powerful celebration of life in which a New England father and son, through suffering and joy, transcend their imprisoning lives and offer new ways of perceiving the world and mortality."[25]
^"An inventive investigation of growing up and growing old in the digital age, displaying a big-hearted curiosity about cultural change at warp speed."[26]
^"An exquisitely crafted novel that carries the reader on an adventuresome journey into the depths of totalitarian North Korea and into the most intimate spaces of the human heart."[28]
^"A beautifully written coming-of-age novel with exquisitely drawn characters that follows a grieving boy's entanglement with a small famous painting that has eluded destruction, a book that stimulates the mind and touches the heart."[29]
^"An imaginative and intricate novel inspired by the horrors of World War II and written in short, elegant chapters that explore human nature and the contradictory power of technology."[30]
^"A layered immigrant tale told in the wry, confessional voice of a "man of two minds" -- and two countries, Vietnam and the United States."[31]
^"For a smart melding of realism and allegory that combines the violence of slavery and the drama of escape in a myth that speaks to contemporary America."[32]
^"A generous book, musical in its prose and expansive in its structure and range, about growing older and the essential nature of love."[33]
^"An ingeniously structured narrative that branches and canopies like the trees at the core of the story whose wonder and connectivity echo those of the humans living amongst them."[34]
^"A spare and devastating exploration of abuse at a reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida that is ultimately a powerful tale of human perseverance, dignity and redemption."[35]
^"A majestic, polyphonic novel about a community’s efforts to halt the proposed displacement and elimination of several Native American tribes in the 1950s, rendered with dexterity and imagination."[36]
^"A mordant, linguistically deft historical novel about the ambiguities of the Jewish American experience, presenting ideas and disputes as volatile as its tightly-wound plot."[37]
^"A riveting novel set in a bygone America that explores family, wealth and ambition through linked narratives rendered in different literary styles, a complex examination of love and power in a country where capitalism is king."[39]
^"A masterful recasting of “David Copperfield,” narrated by an Appalachian boy whose wise, unwavering voice relates his encounters with poverty, addiction, institutional failures and moral collapse–and his efforts to conquer them.[40]
^"A beautifully rendered novel set in West Virginia's Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in the aftermath of the Civil War, where a severely wounded Union veteran, a 12-year-old girl and her mother, long abused by a Confederate soldier, struggle to heal."[41]
^"An accomplished reconsideration of ‘Huckleberry Finn’ that gives agency to Jim to illustrate the absurdity of racial supremacy and provide a new take on the search for family and freedom."[42]
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 3.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 6.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 6.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 8.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 8.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 10.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 10.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 106.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 11.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 11.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. pp. 11, 12.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 12.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 12.ISBN9783598301919.
^Fischer, Heinz-D.; Fischer, Erika J. (2007).The Pulitzer Prize Archive: A History and Anthology of Award-winning Material in Journalism, Letters and Arts — Chronicle of the Pulitzer Prizes for Fiction: Discussions, Decision and Documents. Berlin: K.G. Saur. p. 12.ISBN9783598301919.
^abcMcDowell, Edwin (11 May 1984)."PUBLISHING: PULITZER CONTROVERSIES".The New York Times. Retrieved2018-04-19.[I]n 1941, after both the jury and the board voted to give the fiction prize to Ernest Hemingway'sFor Whom the Bell Tolls, Nicholas Murray Butler, president of Columbia andex-officio chairman of the board, forced the board to change its vote because he found the book offensive.
^Fischer, Heinz Dietrich; Fischer, Erika J. (1997).Novel/Fiction Awards 1917–1994: From Pearl S. Buck and Margaret Mitchell to Ernest Hemingway and John Updike. The Pulitzer Prize Archive. Vol. 10 (in part D, "Belles Lettres"). München: K.G. Saur. pp. LX–LXI.ISBN9783110972115.OCLC811400780.
Michael's Cunningham's "Letter from the Pulitzer Fiction Jury: What Really Happened This Year,"The New Yorker —Part One (July 9, 2012) andPart Two (July 10, 2012)
.png)
_1923.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpeg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.png)
.png)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
_(cropped).jpg)
_(cropped).jpg)
.jpg)
