Many literary awards give significant remunerations. This is a list of active literary awards from around the world with a prize of at least US$ 100,000 or equivalent. Although global in scope and comprising over 35 awards, most of the prizes are in only four currencies: United Arab Emirates dirham, Swedish krona, Euro, and United States dollar.
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| Equivalent in US$ (January 2020) | Prize amount | Prize name | Type | Host country | Primary language | Notes | Ref(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,361,210 | Dhs. 5,000,000 | Million's Poet | — | UAE | Arabic | Award for a single poem. Total prizes for 2nd to 5th positions are $2,723,000. Sister prize of Prince of Poets | [1] |
| 1,160,000 | € 1,000,000 | Premio Planeta de Novela (winner) | Book | Spain | Spanish | See also runner-up of same prize. | [2] |
| 1,043,751 | SKr 9,000,000 | Nobel Prize in Literature | Author | Sweden | Any | There are five Nobel Prizes of 9 million kronor each. | [3] |
| 524,527 | SKr 5,000,000 | Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award | Author | Sweden | Any | [4] | |
| 300,000 | US$ 300,000 | The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize | Author* | United States | English | Open to all arts, not just writers. | [5] |
| 277,898 | NKr 2,500,000 | International Ibsen Award | Author* | Norway | Any | Any drama and theater position eligible, not just writers. | [6] |
| 272,242 | Dhs. 1,000,000 | Prince of Poets | — | UAE | Arabic | Award for a single poem. Sister prize of Million's Poet | [7] |
| 260,000 | US$ 260,000 | Katara Prize for Arabic Novel | Book | Qatar | Arabic | Plus 4 winners of $60,000 and 5 of $30,000. Total prize pool is $650,000 | [8] |
| 250,000 | US$ 250,000 | Carlos Fuentes International Prize for Literary Creation in the Spanish Language | Author | Mexico | Spanish | [9] | |
| 221,097 | € 200,000 | Prix mondial Cino Del Duca | Author | France | Any | ||
| 211,743 | Dhs. 777,777 | Sheikh Zayed Book Award | Book | United Arab Emirates | Arabic | 9 awards for a total of AD7,000,000 | [10] |
| 200,000 | US$ 200,000 | Saudi King Abdullah International Award for Translation | Author | Saudi Arabia | Arabic | 5 awards of 200,000 each (1 million total) | [11] |
| 175,000 | US$ 175,000 | Alfaguara Prize | Book | Spain | Spanish | [12] | |
| 165,822 | € 150,000 | Premio Planeta de Novela (runner-up) | Book | Spain | Spanish | See also winner of same prize. | [13] |
| 175,000 | US$ 175,000 | Windham–Campbell Literature Prizes | Author | United States | English | Composed of eight awards of $175,000 each. | [14] [15] |
| 150,000 | US$ 150,000 | Lannan Literary Awards | Author | United States | English | Composed of three awards of $150,000 each. Prize amount last verified for 2007. | [16] |
| 150,000 | US$ 150,000 | FIL Literature Award | Author | Mexico | Spanish | [17] | |
| 147,927 | DKr 1,000,000 | Sonning Prize | Author* | Denmark | Any | Open to all arts not just writers. | [18] |
| 138,180 | € 125,000 | Miguel de Cervantes Prize | Author | Spain | Spanish | [19] | |
| 138,180 | € 125,000 | RBA Prize for Crime Writing | Book | Spain | Any | [20] | |
| 132,653 | € 120,000 | Premio de Novela Fernando Lara | Book | Spain | Spanish | [21] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | Rómulo Gallegos Prize | Book | Venezuela | Spanish | [22] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | Premio Primavera de Novela | Book | Spain | Spanish | [23] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | International Dublin Literary Award | Book | Ireland | English | [24] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | Premio Novela Histórica Alfonso X El Sabio | Book | Spain | Spanish | [25] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | Camões Prize | Author | Portugal Brazil | Portuguese | [26] | |
| 110,544 | € 100,000 | Prémio Leya | Book | Portugal | Portuguese | [27] [28] [29] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Premio de Traducción Literaria Tomás Segovia | Author | Mexico | Spanish | Translator award | [30] |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation and International Understanding | Book | Qatar | Arabic | Translation award. Total award value is $2 million. | [31] |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Nigeria Prize for Literature | Book | Nigeria | English | [32] [33] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Pritzker Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing | Author | United States | English | [34] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize | Author | United States | English | [35] [36] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Wallace Stevens Award | Author | United States | English | [37] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature | Book | United States | English | [38] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | The Kingsley and Kate Tufts Poetry Awards | Author | United States | English | [39] | |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Sultan Bin Ali Al Owais Cultural Awards | Author | United Arab Emirates | Arabic | Composed of five awards of $100,000 each. | [40] |
| 100,000 | US$ 100,000 | Park Kyong-ni Prize | Author | South Korea | Any | [41] |
The following awards have a superlative claim within certain defined categories, as described and sourced in the Notes column.
| Equivalent in US$ (April 2016) | Prize amount | Prize name | Type | Host country | Primary language | Claim |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 524,527 | SKr 5,000,000 | Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award | Children's literature | Sweden | Any | The richest children's literature prize in the world. [42] |
| 138,180 | € 125,000 | RBA Prize for Crime Writing | Crime fiction | Spain | Any | "The world's most lucrative crime fiction prize." [20] |
| 75,000 | US$ 75,000 | Cundill Prize | Non-fiction and history | Canada | English | "the world's largest non-fiction purse" [43] |
| 55,270 | € 50,000 | Premio de Narrativa Breve Ribera del Duero | Short story collection | Spain | Spanish | "the largest in the world for a competition of this kind". [44] |
| 39,358 | £ 30,000 | Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award | Short story | United Kingdom | English | "The world's richest short story prize" (single short story). [45] |
| 38,081 | Can$ 50,000 | Montreal International Poetry Prize | Poetry | Canada | Any | Thought to be the world's richest award for a single-poem. [46] |
Astrid Anna Emilia Lindgren was a Swedish writer of fiction and screenplays. She is best known for several children's book series, featuring Pippi Longstocking, Emil of Lönneberga, Karlsson-on-the-Roof, and the Six Bullerby Children, and for the children's fantasy novels Mio, My Son, Ronia the Robber's Daughter, and The Brothers Lionheart. Lindgren worked on the Children's Literature Editorial Board at the Rabén & Sjögren publishing house in Stockholm and wrote more than 30 books for children. In 2017, she was calculated to be the world's 18th most translated author. Lindgren had by 2010 sold roughly 167 million books worldwide. In 1994, she was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for "her unique authorship dedicated to the rights of children and respect for their individuality." Her opposition to corporal punishment of children resulted in the world's first law on the matter in 1979, while her campaigning for animal welfare led to a new law, Lex Lindgren, in time for her 80th birthday.
Katherine Womeldorf Paterson is an American writer best known for children's novels, including Bridge to Terabithia. For four different books published 1975–1980, she won two Newbery Medals and two National Book Awards. She is one of four people to win the two major international awards; for "lasting contribution to children's literature" she won the biennial Hans Christian Andersen Award for Writing in 1998 and for her career contribution to "children's and young adult literature in the broadest sense" she won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award from the Swedish Arts Council in 2006, the biggest monetary prize in children's literature. Also for her body of work she was awarded the NSK Neustadt Prize for Children's Literature in 2007 and the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal from the American Library Association in 2013. She was the second US National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, serving 2010 and 2011.
The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award is an international children's literary award established by the Swedish government in 2002 to honour the Swedish children's author Astrid Lindgren (1907–2002). The prize is five million SEK, making it the richest award in children's literature and one of the richest literary prizes in the world. The annual cost of 10 million SEK is financed with tax money.
José Eduardo Agualusa Alves da Cunha is an Angolan journalist and writer of Portuguese and Brazilian descent. He studied agronomy and silviculture in Lisbon, Portugal. Currently he resides in the Island of Mozambique, working as a writer and journalist. He also has been working to establish a public library on the island.
Leonardo de la Caridad Padura Fuentes is a Cuban novelist and journalist. As of 2007, he is one of Cuba's best-known writers internationally. In his native Spanish, as well as in English and some other languages, he is often referred to by the shorter form of his name, Leonardo Padura. He has written screenplays, two books of short stories, and a series of detective novels translated into 10 languages. In 2012, Padura was awarded the National Prize for Literature, Cuba's national literary award and the most important award of its kind. In 2015, he was awarded the Premio Principe de Asturias de las Letras of Spain, one of the most important literary prizes in the Spanish-speaking world and usually considered as the Iberoamerican Nobel Prize.
Marisol Misenta, known professionally under the mononym Isol, is an Argentine creator of children's picture books and a pop singer. For her career contribution to "children's and young adult literature in the broadest sense" she won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award from the Swedish Arts Council in 2013, the biggest prize in children's literature.
Meg Rosoff is an American writer based in London, United Kingdom. She is best known for the novel How I Live Now, which won the Guardian Prize, Printz Award, and Branford Boase Award and made the Whitbread Awards shortlist. Her second novel, Just in Case, won the annual Carnegie Medal from the British librarians recognising the year's best children's book published in the UK.
The Selma Lagerlöf Prize is a Swedish literary prize awarded to an author writing in the spirit of Selma Lagerlöf who was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. The prize was founded by the Sunne Municipality in 1983 and has been awarded annually since 1984. Recipients receive 100,000 Swedish kronor. The awards ceremony takes place in Sunne every August 13 and is in honor of Selma Lagerlöf.
The Prémio Leya is a Portuguese literary award established in 2008 and awarded annually by the Portuguese book publishing company Leya to an unpublished Portuguese-language novel. The winner receives €100,000, making it one of the richest literary prizes in the world.
The Alfaguara Novel Prize is a Spanish-language literary award. The award is one of the most prestigious in the Spanish language. It includes a prize of US$175,000 making it one of the richest literary prizes in the world. It is sponsored by Alfaguara, a publisher owned by Penguin Random House.
Maria Teresa Andruetto is an Argentine writer. She has written poems, novels, drama and children's books. For her "lasting contribution to children's literature" she received the biennial Hans Christian Andersen Medal in 2012.
Valter Hugo Mãe is the artistic name of the Portuguese writer Valter Hugo Lemos. He is also an editor, singer and plastic artist. Valter Hugo Mãe received the José Saramago Prize in Literature in 2007 for his novel o remorso de baltazar serapião.
Janette Becerra is a Puerto Rican poet, writer, teacher and literary critic. She obtained an MA in comparative literature and a Ph.D. in Spanish literature at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus. She has been a professor of Hispanic Studies at the University of Puerto Rico at Cayey since 2000.
Premio Tusquets de Novela is a literary prize promoted by the Spanish Tusquets Editores, for writers in Spanish language. First awarded in the 2005 Feria Internacional del Libro de Guadalajara.
The National Novel Award is one of the main literary awards given annually in Bolivia. It is convened by the Ministry of Cultures, and originally sponsored by Grupo Santillana, through the Alfaguara publishing house. It was established in 1998 to promote the dissemination of Bolivian literature in the novel genre and better awareness of its authors.
Ana Margarida Taborda Duarte Martins de Carvalho is a Portuguese writer and journalist. The only Portuguese writer to be award with the Grande Prémio da Associação Portuguesa de Escritores (APE/DGLB) for each of her three successive works of literary fiction; they were for two novels and a short-story collection.
Alicia Escardó Vegh is a Uruguayan writer, cultural manager, and multimedia e-learning content creator.
Tamara Kamenszain was an Argentine poet and essayist.
We realized that there's nothing on that scale for just one poem. And so there was an opportunity there. And when we started to think of it globally, that's when we realized how unique it could be.