2023 PEN America Literary Award Winners

The 2023 PEN American Literary Award Winners person been announced! This year’s awards conferred $350,000 to writers and translators successful eleven antithetic categories that see fiction, nonfiction, poetry, biography, essay, subject writing, lit successful translation, and more. The winners were announced unrecorded astatine the PEN America Literary Awards Ceremony connected March 2, astatine The Town Hall successful New York City, hosted by actor, author, and erstwhile Obama White House adjutant Kal Penn.

This year’s beingness accomplishment awards were fixed to comedian and writer Tina Fey, writer Vinod Kumar Shukl, considered 1 of the top modern writers successful the Hindi connection and acclaimed playwright Erika Dickerson-Despenza. There were 1,744 full entries and this year’s winners proceed the PEN American contented of honoring a divers and exceptional radical of writers and translators from each implicit this state and the world, including aggregate wins for Indigenous authors; a triumph for translator Tiffany Tsao, for her translation of 1 of Indonesia’s astir salient writers; Budi Darma; and different thrilling wins.

One of the highlights of the nighttime was Percival Everett’s triumph of the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Everett is the writer of implicit 30 books since his debut was released successful 1983 and is beloved successful literate circles. This triumph builds connected different caller designation of his work, including being a Pulitzer Prize finalist successful 2020, shortlisted for the Booker Prize successful 2022, and being awarded the 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award astatine the National Book Critics Circle Awards. “I don’t spell retired much, and for an aged horseman this is benignant of tough. I’d similar to convey PEN for each they bash — it’s an astonishing organization. For the past 30 years I’ve had 1 cause [who] told maine erstwhile we archetypal started moving together, ‘you’re ne'er going to marque maine immoderate money, truthful conscionable constitute what you privation to write. It was possibly not well-advised, but I did.”

PEN America celebrates its 100 twelvemonth day this twelvemonth and big Kal Pen spotlighted the engaged twelvemonth that PEN America has had with the ever expanding question of censorship and publication bans sweeping crossed American classrooms, schoolhouse boards, and statehouses. He encouraged guests and viewers to proceed to support the state to read. This twelvemonth besides marks the 60th day of the PEN Translation Prize, the archetypal of the prizes to beryllium presented 60 years ago. Actor, author, and translator Molly Ringwald presented the translation prizes. This year’s awards honored translations of books by authors from 20 antithetic countries and translators moving successful much than a twelve languages.

2023 PEN America Literary Awards

PEN/Jean Stein Book Award ($75,000)

This grant is fixed to a book-length enactment of immoderate genre for its originality, merit, and impact, which has breached caller crushed by reshaping the boundaries of its signifier and signaling beardown imaginable for lasting influence. And this year’s judges are Joan Naviyuk Kane, Lauren Groff, and Madeleine Thien.

Winner: Dr. No by Percival Everett (Graywolf Press)

PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection ($25,000)

This grant is fixed to an writer whose debut postulation of abbreviated stories represents distinguished literate accomplishment and suggests large committedness for aboriginal work. And this year’s judges are Nafissa Thompson Spires, Chris Gonzalez, and Susan Muaddi Darraj.

Winner: Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty (Tin House Books)

PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel ($10,000)

This grant is fixed to a debut caller of exceptional literate merit by an American author. And this year’s judges are Gina Apostol, Oscar Cásares, and Matthew Salesses.

Winner: Calling For a Blanket Dance by Oscar Hokeah (Algonquin Books)

PEN Award for Poetry successful Translation ($3,000)

This grant is fixed to a book-length translation of poesy from immoderate connection into English. And this year’s judges are Baba Badji, Mona Kareem, and Julia Leverone.

Winner: The Loose Pearl by Paula Ilabaca Nuñez, translated from Spanish by Daniel Borzutzky (Coimpress)

PEN Translation Prize ($3,000)

This grant is fixed to a book-length translation of prose from immoderate connection into English. And this year’s judges are Layla Benitez-James, Slava Faybysh, Sora Kim-Russell, and Elton Uliana.

Winner: People from Bloomington by Budi Darma, translated from Indonesian by Tiffany Tsao (Penguin Classics)

PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay ($15,000)

This grant is fixed to a seasoned writer whose postulation of essays is an enlargement connected their corpus of enactment and preserves the distinguished creation signifier of the essay. And this year’s judges are Jill Lepore, John McWhorter, and Simon Winchester.

Winner: A Left-Handed Woman by Judith Thurman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

PEN Open Book Award ($10,000)

This grant is fixed to an exceptional book-length enactment of immoderate literate genre by an writer of color. This year’s judges are Jenn Baker, Maurice Carlos Ruffin, Nina McConigley, and Erika L. Sanchez.

Winner: The Black Period by Hafizah Augustus Geter (Random House)

PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award

This grant is fixed to a enactment that exemplifies literate excellence connected the taxable of the carnal oregon biologic sciences and communicates analyzable technological concepts to a laic audience. And this year’s judges are Tim Folger, David Hu, and Emily Raboteau.

Winner: Heartbreak by Florence Williams (W. W. Norton & Company)

PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry Collection

This grant is fixed to a writer whose distinguished postulation of poesy represents a notable and accomplished literate presence. This year’s judges are Kimiko Hahn, Molly McCully Brown, Allison Rollins, and Willie Perdomo.

Winner: To The Realization of Perfect Helplessness by Robin Coste Lewis (Penguin Random House)

PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography ($5,000)

This grant is fixed to a biography of exceptional literary, narrative, and creator merit, based connected scrupulous research. And this year’s judges are Manu Bhagavan and Silvana Paternostro.

Winner: Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm by Dan Charnas (MCD)

PEN/JOHN KENNETH GALBRAITH AWARD FOR NONFICTION

This grant is fixed to a distinguished publication of wide nonfiction possessing notable literate merit and captious position that illuminates important modern issues. And this year’s judges are Sanjiv Bhattacharya, Geraldo Cadava, and Sofija Stefanovic.

Winner: The Inheritors: An Intimate Portrait of South Africa’s Racial Reckoning by Eve Fairbanks (Simon & Schuster)

Looking for adjacent much large recommendations? Check retired the implicit 2023 PEN American Literary Award Longlists.