List: The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (formerly called the Prize for the Novel) has been awarded since 1918 for distinguished works of fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life. During some years (1920, 1941, 1946, 1954, 1957, 1964, 1971, 1974, 1977, and 2012) no award was given.

Those I have read are in red. Those currently on my TBR shelf are in blue, although I intend to read them all eventually. If anyone else is reading all the winners, I am happy to add a link to your progress reports. Please leave a comment with your link and I will add it.

The Prize winners since 1918 are:

2018: Less by Andrew Sean Greer

2017: The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

2016: The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

2015: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doer

2014: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

2013: The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson

2011: A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

2010: Tinkers by Paul Harding (reviewed here)

2009: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (reviewed here)

2008: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

2007: The Road by Cormack McCarthy

2006: March by Geraldine Brooks (reviewed here)

2005: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson (reviewed here)

2004: The Known World by Edward P. Jones

2003: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

2002: Empire Falls by Richard Russo (reviewed here)

2001: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

2000: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

1999: The Hours by Michael Cunningham

1998: American Pastoral by Philip Roth

1997: Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser (reviewed here)

1996: Independence Day by Richard Ford

1995: The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields

1994: The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx

1993: A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler

1992: A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley

1991: Rabbit At Rest by John Updike

1990: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos

1989: Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler (reviewed here)

1988: Beloved by Toni Morrison

1987: A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor (short review here)

1986: Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

1985: Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie

1984: Ironweed by William Kennedy

1983: The Color Purple by Alice Walker

1982: Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike

1981: A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy O'Toole

1980: The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer

1979: The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever (reviewed here)

1978: Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson

1976: Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow (reviewed here)

1975: The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara

1973: The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty

1972: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner

1970: Collected Storiesby Jean Stafford

1969: House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday

1968: The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron

1967: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud (reviewed here)

1966: Collected Stories by Katherine Anne Porter

1965: The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau

1963: The Reivers by William Faulkner

1962: The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O'Connor

1961: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury (reviewed here)

1959: The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor

1958: A Death in the Family by James Agee

1956: Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor

1955: A Fable by William Faulkner

1953: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

1952: The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk

1951: The Town by Conrad Richter

1950: The Way West by A. B. Guthrie, Jr.

1949: Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens

1948: Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

1947: All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren (reviewed here)

1945: A Bell for Adano by John Hersey (reviewed here)

1944: Journey in the Dark by Martin Flavin

1943: Dragon's Teeth by Upton Sinclair

1942: In This Our Life by Ellen Glasgow

1940: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

1939: The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

1938: The Late George Apley by John Phillips Marquand

1937: Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

1936: Honey in the Horn by Harold L. Davis

1935: Now in November by Josephine Winslow Johnson

1934: Lamb in His Bosom by Caroline Miller

1933: The Store by T. S. Stribling

1932: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

1931: Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes

1930: Laughing Boy by Oliver Lafarge

1929: Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin

1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder

1927: Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield

1926: Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis

1925: So Big by Edna Ferber

1924: The Able McLaughlins by Margaret Wilson

1923: One of Ours by Willa Cather

1922: Alice Adams by Booth Tarkington (reviewed here)

1921: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

1919: The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington

1918: His Family by Ernest Poole


NOTE

Updated December 31, 2018.

OTHERS READING THE PULITZER WINNERS

If you are working on reading all the Pulitzer fiction winners and want to list your blog or related link here, please leave a comment with the link and I will add it.

The Pulitzer Project (a group blog)
Rebecca Reads

Merry Christmas!

Christmas is my favorite day of the year. I hope everyone is celebrating in their favorite way! 

By pure serendipity, this is also my 1,000th blog post. That is quite a milestone. Another cause for celebrating around my house.

1 Day to Christmas

Literary Blog Hop: Wallflowers

The Blue Bookcase hosts a "Literary Blog Hop" for blogs "that primarily feature reviews of literary fiction, classic literature, and general literary discussion."

Each week, in addition to hopping around and visiting some terrific book blogs, participants answer a bookish question.  This week's question comes from Lisa at bibliophiliac:

What literary title (fiction or non-fiction) do you love that has been under-appreciated? We all know about the latest Dan Brown, and James Patterson isn't hurting for publicity. What quiet masterpiece do you want more readers to know?

There are plenty of books I've read that I think deserve a wider audience.  David Lodge's How Far Can You Go? (reviewed here), The Assistant by Bernard Malamud (reviewed here), and  Play It As It Laysby Joan Didion (reviewed here) are just three I can think of off the top of my head.

But if I had to choose one "quiet masterpiece" to champion, it would be The Road Home by Jim Harrison.  In general, Harrison is an under-appreciated American treasure, which he has made a career out of.  A good part of his memoir, Off to the Side, is his telling of his life on the fringes of literary society.

The Road Home is a sweeping, multi-generational story in "The Great American Novel" tradition.  Set in the sandhills of Nebraska, the book takes up where Harrison's prior novel, Dalva, left off, filling in the story of Dalva's family, the formidable Northridges.  There are pioneers, farmers, Indians, artists, lovers, and birdwatchers.  There is art, literature, food, wine, love, and death.  It is wonderful.

My Top 10 list will always include The Road Home.  I've read it twice, including reading it out loud to my husband on a long road trip. I will read it again, for sure.

2 Days to Christmas