by Taylor Follett
The 2018 PEN American Literary Award Winners were announced on February 20th in PEN America’s 55th annual award ceremony. The PEN Awards pride themselves in their long history of bestowing awards to influential and diverse voices in literature, the grants they are able to award to well-deserving authors, and most importantly, the incredible books they choose to honor.
As a rule, the books selected by the PEN judges make wonderful reads. This year’s winners are no exception:
Layli Long Soldier
PEN/Jean Stein Book Award
Jenny Zhang
Pen/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction
Alexis Okeowo
Pen Open Book Award
Ursula K. Le Guin
PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay
Magda Szabó, trans. by Len Rix
PEN Translation Prize
Lindsey Fitzharris
PEN/E.O. Wilson Prize for Literary Science Writing
The PEN Awards don’t honor only individual books—they also give awards based on authors’ contributions and entire body of work. All of the honorees are prolific and influential, and this is only a small selection of their award winning works. Find out why these authors were chosen here or just learn firsthand by reading their works:
Edmund White
PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction
Edna O’Brien
PEN/Nabakov Award for Achievement in International Literature
Kamau Brathwaite
PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry
Yoram Kaniuk, Trans. by Barbara Harshav
PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation
Luis Alfaro
PEN/Laura Pels Award for Master Dramatist
Dave Kindred
PEN/ESPN Lifetime Achievement Award for Literary Sports Writing
Happy reading!