Top 75 High-End Literary Awards and Important Prizes

"The pen is mightier than the sword." - Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton.

A LITERARY AWARD is an award presented in recognition of a particularly lauded literary piece or body of work. It is normally presented to an author.

Most literary awards come with a corresponding award ceremony. Many awards are structured with one organization (usually a non-profit organization) as the presenter and public face of the award, and another organization as the financial sponsor or backer, who pays the prize remuneration and the cost of the ceremony and public relations, typically a corporate sponsor who may sometimes attach their name to the award.

Literary Awards & Prizes News & Resources

• Alternative Nobel literature prize planned in Sweden - "After the Swedish Academy cancelled the traditional prize this year, the New Academy plans a parallel honour in October."
• Arguments, anticipation & carefully encouraged scandals: the making of the Booker prize - "Its knack for creating tension and controversy has helped it remain an energising force in publishing for more than 50 years - but how do writers, publishers and judges cope with the annual agony of the Booker?"
• AWARD ANNALS - the literary award database.
• Bob Dylan - I'll be at the Nobel Prize ceremony... if I can - The Telegraph.
• Geetanjali Shree is first Indian winner of International Booker Prize - "Her novel Tomb of Sand, a family saga set in the shadow of the partition of India, follows an 80-year-old woman after the death of her husband. It was the first Hindi-language book to be shortlisted for the £50,000 prize."
• How do Nobel laureates spend their winnings? - "'The money is a nice part of the process': on winning a Nobel prize. A sum that fluctuates with the investment value of Alfred Nobel’s capital, but is currently worth 8m Swedish kronor (£720,000)?"
• How to write a Man Booker novel - "Madeleine Thien, David Szalay, Deborah Levy, Paul Beatty, Ottessa Moshfegh and Graeme Macrae Burnet reveal the inspirations behind the books competing for the UK’s top literary prize."
• Is Superman Circumcised? favourite to win Oddest book title of the year 2021 - "This year’s Diagram prize also pits Curves for the Mathematically Curious against The Life Cycle of Russian Things and Hats: A Very Unnatural History."
• Jon Fosse wins the 2023 Nobel prize in literature - "The Norwegian author of novels, short stories and Pinteresque drama was praised by the judges for ‘giving voice to the unsayable’."
• LIST OF LITERARY AWARDS - Wikipedia.
• List of poetry awards - Wikipedia.
• List of richest literary prizes - Wikipedia.
• Literary award - Wikipedia.
• NOBEL LAUREATES IN LITERATURE - Nobel Foundation.
• Nobel panel gives up knockin’ on Bob Dylan’s door - "Days after being awarded the literature prize, Bob Dylan has yet to get in touch with the Swedish Academy, or indicate whether he will attend the celebrations."
• Pretentious, impenetrable, hard work ... better? Why we need difficult books - "This year’s Booker-winner Milkman has been criticised for being challenging. But are we confusing readability with literary value?"
• Public fights, resignations & a sex scandal: what's going on with the Nobel prize? - "The normally secretive members of the Swedish Academy are embroiled in all-out war – but the collapse of this self-important bulwark of patriarchy and privilege is not over yet."
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• Swedish Academy - founded in 1786 by King Gustav III, is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. Its 18 members, who are elected for life, comprise the highest Swedish language authority. Outside Scandinavia, it is best known as the body that chooses the laureates for the annual Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded in memory of the donor Alfred Nobel.
• The Swedish Academy postpones the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature - Svenska Akademien.
• The ugly scandal that cancelled the Nobel prize - "Sweden’s literary elite has been thrown into disarray by allegations of sexual harassment and corruption."
• THERE'S NOTHING NOBLE ABOUT SCIENCE’S NOBEL PRIZE GENDER GAP - "Given the dearth of women receiving the top science prizes, it's time for the Nobel Committee to revamp how it awards great work."
• What it's like to win a Nobel Prize - "Hearing you've won a Nobel is incredible for most people. For some, it just spoils their sleep."
• Why top academics don't need a Nobel to get rich - "News that philosopher Charles Taylor has scooped $1m for the inaugural Berggruen prize is the latest sign of a rise in big-payout humanities awards."

Top 75 High-End Literary Awards & Prizes

• Agatha Award - since 1989. Literary awards for mystery and crime writers who write via the same method as Agatha Christie (i.e. closed setting, no sex or violence, amateur detective).
• AMERICAN BOOK AWARD - established in 1978 by the Before Columbus Foundation. It seeks to recognize outstanding literary achievement by contemporary American authors, without restriction to race, sex, ethnic background, or genre.
• Anthony Awards - literary awards for mystery writers presented at the Bouchercon World Mystery Convention since 1986.
• Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award - Swedish children's literature award.
• Bad Sex in Fiction Award - since 1993. Presented annually by The Literary Review.
• BARRY AWARD - crime literary prize awarded annually since 1997 by the editors of Deadly Pleasures, an American quarterly publication for crime fiction readers. From 2007-2009 the award was jointly presented with the publication Mystery News. The prize is named after Barry Gardner, an American critic.
• Betty Trask Award - since 1984. Are for first novels written by authors under the age of 35, who reside in a current or former Commonwealth nation. Each year the awards total £20,000, with one author receiving a larger prize amount, called the "Prize", and the remainder given to one or more other writers, called the "Awards".
• Blixenprisen - since 2015. Danish literary prize named after Danish author Karen Blixen.
• Bollingen Prize - since 1948. Literary honor bestowed on an American poet in recognition of the best book of new verse within the last two years, or for lifetime achievement.
• BOOKER PRIZES - since 1969. "The Booker Prize is the leading literary award in the English speaking world, and has brought recognition, reward and readership to outstanding fiction for over five decades." Each year, the prize is awarded to what is, in the opinion of the judges, the best novel of the year written in English and published in the UK and Ireland. It is a prize that transforms the winner’s career. The winner receives £50,000 as well as the £2,500 awarded to each of the six shortlisted authors. Both the winner and the shortlisted authors are guaranteed a global readership and can expect a dramatic increase in book sales.
• BOWDOIN PRIZE - prestigious award given annually to Harvard University undergraduate and graduate students. It is considered among the highest academic commendations the University can bestow upon a student.
• Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (BLFC) - since 1982. Tongue-in-cheek contest, held annually and sponsored by the English Department of San Jose State University in San Jose, California. Entrants are invited "to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels" - that is, deliberately bad.
• Carnegie Medal - since 1936. British literary award that annually recognises one outstanding new book for children or young adults.
• Cartier Diamond Dagger - award given by the Crime Writers' Association of Great Britain to authors who have made an outstanding lifetime's contribution to the genre.
• Costa Book Awards - series of literary awards given to books by authors based in Great Britain and Ireland. The awards, launched in 1971, are given both for high literary merit but also for works that are enjoyable reading and whose aim is to convey the enjoyment of reading to the widest possible audience. As such, they are a more populist literary prize than the Booker Prize.
• CRIME THRILLER AWARDS - British awards ceremony dedicated to crime thriller fiction.
• CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger - annual award given by the British Crime Writers' Association for best thriller of the year. The award is sponsored by the estate of Ian Fleming and is given to "best adventure/thriller novel in the vein of James Bond".
• CWA New Blood Dagger - annual award given by the British Crime Writers' Association (CWA) for first books by previously unpublished writers.
• Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year - since 1978. The Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year, originally known as the Diagram Group Prize for the Oddest Title and commonly known as the Diagram Prize, is a humorous literary award that is given annually to a book with an unusual title.
• DILEY AWARD - presented every year since 1992 by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. It is given to the mystery title of the year which the member booksellers have most enjoyed selling.
• Duncan Lawrie International Dagger - first awarded in 2006. The richest crime-writing prize in the world. Award given by the Crime Writers' Association for best translated crime novel of the year.
• Edgar Awards - presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America. They honor the best in mystery fiction, non-fiction, television, film, and theatre published or produced in the previous year.
• European Crime Fiction Awards
• European Crime Fiction Star Award
• Financial Times & McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award - since 2005. Annual award given to the best business book of the year as determined by the Financial Times and McKinsey & Company. It aims to find the book that has ‘the most compelling and enjoyable insight into modern business issues.’
• Fitzgerald Literary Award - the Scott Fitzgerald prize is awarded annually in May and reward a literary novel reflecting "the elegance, wit, style and taste of the art of living" of the American writer, author of The Great Gatsby by the Society Club at Hôtel Belles Rives at Juan-les-Pins, France.
• Franz Kafka Prize - an international literary award presented in honour of Franz Kafka, the German language novelist. The prize was first awarded in 2001 and is co-sponsored by the Franz Kafka Society and the city of Prague, Czech Republic.
• GALAXY BRITISH BOOK AWARDS - the Oscars of the book world.
• Goethe Medal - since 1955. Also known as the Goethe-Medaille, is a yearly prize given by the Goethe Institute honoring non-Germans for meritorious contributions in the spirit of the Institute. It is an official decoration of the Federal Republic of Germany. The prize was given on March 22, the anniversary of Goethe's death. After 2008 it is given on August 28, the anniversary of Goethe's birth.
• GOLD DAGGER AWARDS - given annually by the Crime Writers' Association for the best crime novel of the year.
• Golden PAN AWARD - since the 1960's PAN has awarded a statue of the god Pan to authors who's books sell over a million copies.
• Grand prix de littÉrature policiÈre - since 1948.
• Grand Prix du roman de l'AcadÉmie franÇaise - French literary award, created in 1918, and given each year by the Académie française. Along with the Prix Goncourt, it is one of the oldest and most prestigious literary awards in France. The Académie française gives out over 60 literary awards each year, the Grand Prix du roman is the most senior for an individual novel.
• Gumshoe Awards - since 2002. American award for popular crime fiction literary works. The Gumshoe Awards are awarded annually by the American Internet magazine Mystery Ink (not to be confused with Mystery Inc.) to recognize the best achievements in crime fiction.
• Gutenberg Prize
• Hans Christian Andersen Awards - known as the "Nobel Prize for childen's literature".
• HEINEMANN AWARD - the W. H. Heinemann Award is an award established by William Heinemann who bequeathed funds to the Royal Society of Literature to establish a literary prize, given from 1945 to 2003.
• Helmerich Award - since 1985. American literary prize awarded by the Tulsa Library Trust in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It is bestowed annually upon an "internationally acclaimed" author who has "written a distinguished body of work and made a major contribution to the field of literature and letters".
• International Dublin Literary Award - since 1996. International literary award presented each year for a novel written in English or translated into English. At €100,000, the award is one of the richest literary prizes in the world.
• International Nonino Prize - Nonino also founded the International Nonino Prize, originally designed to award and preserve Friulian traditions but which has developed into a prestigious literary prize. The prize was founded in 1975.
• International Prize for Arabic Fiction - literary prize managed in association with the Booker Prize Foundation in London, and supported by the Emirates Foundation in Abu Dhabi.
• James Tait Black Memorial Prizes - founded in 1919. Are among the oldest and most prestigious book prizes awarded for literature written in the English language and are Britain's oldest literary awards.
• Jerusalem Prize - since 1963. Biennial literary award given to writers whose works have dealt with themes of human freedom in society.
• LES DEUX MAGOTS LITERARY PRIZE - "Created in 1933 as an alternative to the Prix Goncourt, considered too academic."
• LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZES - the Prizes "currently have nine single-title categories: biography, current interest, fiction, first fiction (the Art Seidenbaum Award added in 1991), history, mystery/thriller (category added in 2000), poetry, science and technology (category added in 1989), and young adult fiction (category added in 1998). In addition, the Robert Kirsch Award is presented annually to a living author with a substantial connection to the American West whose contribution to American letters deserves special recognition."
• Macavity Awards - literary award for mystery writers. Nominated and voted upon annually by the members of the Mystery Readers International.
• Martin Beck Award - since 1971. Award given by the Swedish Crime Writers' Academy (Svenska Deckarakademin) for the best crime novel in translation. It is one of the most prestigious international crime-writing awards.
• National Book Awards - British literary award for the best UK writers and their works, as selected by an academy of members from the British book publishing industry.
• NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS - a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the prior year.
• NERO AWARD - literary award for excellence in the mystery genre presented by The Wolfe Pack, a society founded in 1978.
• New Academy Prize in Literature - established in 2018 in lieu of the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was not awarded in 2018.
• NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE - awarded annually, since 1901, to an author from any country who has, in the words from the will of Alfred Nobel, produced "in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction".
• Norman Mailer Prize - American literary award established in 2009 by The Norman Mailer Center and The Norman Mailer Writers Colony to celebrate writers and their works. Prizes were given in the years 2009-2015.
• O. Henry Award - annual American award given to short stories of exceptional merit. The award is named after the American short story writer, O. Henry.
• Ondaatje Prize - annual literary award given by the Royal Society of Literature. The £10,000 award is given for a work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry which evokes the "spirit of a place", and which is written by someone who is a citizen of or who has been resident in the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland.
• Orwell Prize - since 1993. British prize for political writing of outstanding quality. Two prizes are awarded each year: one for a book and one for journalism; between 2009 and 2012, a third prize was awarded for blogging. In each case, the winner is the short-listed entry which comes closest to George Orwell's own ambition to "make political writing into an art".
• PEN Pinter Prize - & the Pinter International Writer of Courage Award both comprise an annual literary award launched in 2009 by English PEN in honour of the late Nobel Literature Prize-winning playwright Harold Pinter, who had been a Vice President of English PEN and an active member of the International PEN Writers in Prison Committee (WiPC).
• Premio Nadal - the oldest literary prize in the Spanish-speaking world. Spanish literary prize awarded annually by the publishing house Ediciones Destino, part of Planeta. It has been awarded every year on 6 January since 1944.
• Prix Archon-DespÉrouses - Prix de poésie. Prix annuel créé en 1834, attribué à des œuvres de poètes.
• Prix Balzac - prix littéraire créé par Bernard Grasset dans les années 1920, pour primer les ouvrages de sa maison d’édition.
• Prix Cazes brasserie Lipp - awarded to a French novel every year since 1935.
• Prix Femina - French literary prize created in 1904 by 22 writers for the magazine La Vie heureuse (today known as Femina). The prize is decided each year by an exclusively female jury, although the authors awarded are not limited to women. The winner is announced on the first Wednesday of November each year.
• Prix Goncourt - since 1903. Prize in French literature, given by the académie Goncourt to the author of "the best and most imaginative prose work of the year". Four other prizes are also awarded: prix Goncourt du Premier Roman (first novel), prix Goncourt de la Nouvelle (short story), prix Goncourt de la Poésie (poetry) and prix Goncourt de la Biographie (biography). Of the "big six" French literary awards, the Prix Goncourt is the best known and most prestigious. The other major literary prizes are the Grand Prix du Roman de l'Académie Française, the Prix Femina, the Prix Renaudot, the Prix Interallié and the Prix Médicis.
• PULITZER PRIZES - since 1917. U.S. award for achievements in newspaper journalism, literature and musical composition.
• REUBEN AWARD - for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year, chosen by a secret ballot of the members of the National Cartoonists Society.
• RIPPER AWARD - since 2008.
• Robert F. Kennedy Book Award - since 1980. Annual award presented to the book which "most faithfully and forcefully reflects Robert Kennedy's purposes."
• SHAMUS AWARD - awarded annually by the Private Eye Writers of America (PWA) for the best detective fiction genre novels and short stories of the year.
• Somerset Maugham Award - British literary prize given each May by the Society of Authors. It is awarded to the best writer or writers of a book published in the past year who is under the age of 35. The prize was instituted in 1947 by William Somerset Maugham and thus bears his name. The award is to be spent on foreign travel. The total fund for each year is £12,000.
• Specsavers National Book Awards - or simply NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS — previously known as the Galaxy National Book Awards (2010–11); British Book Awards or Nibbies (1990–2009) — is a British literary award for the best UK writers and their works, as selected by an academy of members from the British book publishing industry.
• SUNDAY TIMES AWARD FOR LITERARY EXCELLENCE - Oxford Literary Festival.
• The Blixen Literary award - since 2015.
• THE CRIME WRITERS' ASSOCIATION DAGGER AWARDS
• THE EDGAR AWARDS - named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America. They honor the best in mystery fiction, non-fiction, television, film, and theatre published or produced in the previous year.
• THE MAN BOOKER PRIZES - literary prize awarded each year for the best original full-length novel, written in the English language, by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Nations, Ireland, or Zimbabwe. The winner of the Man Booker Prize is generally assured of international renown and success; therefore, the prize is of great significance for the book trade. It is also a mark of distinction for authors to be selected for inclusion in the shortlist or even to be nominated for the "longlist".
• THE MAN BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE - is unique in the world of literature in that it can be won by an author of any nationality, providing that his or her work is available in the English language. It is awarded every second year.
• THE SHAMUS AWARDS - awarded by the Private Eye Writers of America (PWA) for the best detective fiction genre novels and short stories of the year.
• T.S. ELIOT PRIZE - inaugurated in 1993 in celebration of the Poetry Book Society's 40th birthday and in honour of its founding poet, T. S. Eliot.
• Walter Scott Prize - the Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction is a British literary award founded in 2010. At £25,000, it is one of the largest literary awards in the UK. The award was created by the Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch, whose ancestors were closely linked to Scottish author Sir Walter Scott, who is generally considered the originator of historical fiction with the novel Waverley in 1814.
• Wellcome Book Prize - since 2009. Annual British literary award sponsored by Wellcome Trust. In keeping with the vision and goals of Wellcome Trust, the Book Prize "celebrates the topics of health and medicine in literature", including fiction and non-fiction. The winner receives £30,000 making it "one of the most remunerative literature awards on offer."
• WSJ Innovation Awards - "Launched in 2011, WSJ. Magazine’s Innovator Awards recognizes groundbreaking talents from a range of disciplines, including fashion, art, entertainment, architecture, design, technology, the performing arts, philanthropy, food, literature and more. As an annual event, it has blossomed into one of the Wall Street Journal’s signature franchises; the combination of special-edition print issue, red-carpet gala and multiple digital extensions reaches WSJ.’s largest global audience every year."