National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism

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The National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism, established in 1975, is an annual American literary award presented by the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) to promote "the finest books and reviews published in English." [1] Awards are presented annually to books published in the U.S. during the preceding calendar year in six categories: Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Memoir/Autobiography, Biography, and Criticism.

Contents

Books previously published in English are not eligible, such as re-issues and paperback editions. They do consider "translations, short story and essay collections, self published books, and any titles that fall under the general categories." [2]

The judges are the volunteer directors of the NBCC who are 24 members serving rotating three-year terms, with eight elected annually by the voting members, namely "professional book review editors and book reviewers." [3] Winners of the awards are announced each year at the NBCC awards ceremony in conjunction with the yearly membership meeting, which takes place in March. [2]

Recipients

National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism winners and finalists
YearAuthorTitleResultRef.
1975 Paul Fussell The Great War and Modern Memory Winner
1976 Bruno Bettelheim The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales Winner
1977 Susan Sontag On Photography Winner
1978 Meyer Schapiro Modern Art: 19th and 20th Centuries (Selected Papers, Volume 2)Winner
1979 Elaine Pagels The Gnostic GospelsWinner
1980 Helen Vendler Part of Nature, Part of Us: Modern American PoetsWinner
1981 Virgil Thomson A Virgil Thomson ReaderWinner
1982 Gore Vidal The Second American Revolution and Other EssaysWinner
1983 John Updike Hugging the Shore: Essays and CriticismWinner
1984 Robert Hass Twentieth Century Pleasures: Prose on PoetryWinner
1985 William H. Gass Habitations of the Word: EssaysWinner
1986 Joseph Brodsky Less Than One: Selected Essays Winner
1987 Edwin Denby Dance WritingsWinner
1988 Clifford Geertz Works and Lives: The Anthropologist as AuthorWinner
1989 John Clive Not by Fact Alone: Essays on the Writing and Reading of HistoryWinner
1990 Arthur C. Danto Encounters and Reflections: Art in the Historical PresentWinner
1991 Lawrence L. Langer Holocaust Testimonies: The Ruins of MemoryWinner
1992 Garry Wills Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America Winner
1993 John Dizikes Opera in America: A Cultural HistoryWinner
1994 Gerald Early The Culture of Bruising: Essays on Prizefighting, Literature, and Modern American CultureWinner
1995 Robert Darnton The Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France Winner
1996 William H. Gass Finding a FormWinner
1997 Mario Vargas Llosa Making WavesWinner
1998 Gary Giddins Visions of Jazz: The First CenturyWinner
1999 Jorge Luis Borges Selected Non-FictionsWinner
2000 Cynthia Ozick Quarrel & QuandaryWinner
2001 Martin Amis The War Against Cliché: Essays and Reviews, 1971–2000Winner
2002 William H. Gass Tests of TimeWinner
2003 Rebecca Solnit River of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild WestWinner
2004 Patrick Neate Where You're At: Notes From the Frontline of a Hip-Hop PlanetWinner
2005 William Logan The Undiscovered Country: Poetry in the Age of TinWinner [4]
Hal Crowther Gather at the River: Notes From the Post-Millennial SouthFinalist [5]
Arthur Danto Unnatural Wonders
John Updike Still Looking: Essays on American Art
Eliot Weinberger What Happened Here: Bush Chronicles
2006 Lawrence Weschler Everything That Rises: A Book of ConvergencesWinner [6]
Bruce Bawer While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West From Within Finalist
Frederick Crews Follies of the Wise: Dissenting Essays
Daniel Dennett Breaking the Spell: Religion As a Natural Phenomenon
Lia Purpura On Looking: Essays
2007 Alex Ross The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century Winner [7] [8] [9]
Ben Ratliff Coltrane: The Story of a SoundFinalist [8]
Julia Alvarez Once Upon a Quniceanera
Susan Faludi The Terror Dream
Joan Acocella Twenty-Eight Artists and Two Saints
2008 Seth Lerer Children's Literature: A Readers' History: Reader's History from Aesop to Harry PotterWinner [10]
Richard Brody Everything is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc GodardFinalist [11] [10]
Joel L. Kraemer Maimonides: The Life and World of One Of Civilization's Greatest Minds
Reginald Shepard Orpheus in the Bronx: Essays on Identity, Politics, and the Freedom of Poetry
Vivian Gornick The Men in My Life
2009 Eula Biss Notes from No Man's Land: American EssaysWinner [12] [13] [14]
Stephen Burt Close Calls with Nonsense: Reading New PoetryFinalist [12]
Morris Dickstein Dancing in the Dark: A Cultural History of the Great Depression
David Hajdu Heroes and Villains: Essays on Music, Movies, Comics, and Culture
Greg Milner Perfecting Sound Forever: An Aural History of Recorded Music
2010 Clare Cavanagh Lyric Poetry and Modern Politics: Russia, Poland, and the WestWinner [15] [16]
Susie Linfield The Cruel RadianceFinalist [15]
Elif Batuman The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them
Terry Castle The Professor and Other Writings
Ander Monson Vanishing Point: Not a Memoir
2011 Geoff Dyer Otherwise Known as the Human Condition: Selected Essays and ReviewsWinner [17] [18]
David Bellos Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of EverythingFinalist [19] [17] [18]
Dubravka Ugresic Karaoke Culture: Essays
Ellen Willis Out of the Vinyl Deeps: Ellen Willis on Rock Music
Jonathan Lethem The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc.
2012 Marina Warner Stranger Magic: Charmed States and the Arabian NightsWinner [20] [21]
Mary Ruefle Madness, Rack, and HoneyFinalist [22] [23] [20]
Paul Elie Reinventing Bach
Kevin Young The Grey Album: On the Blackness of Blackness
Daniel Mendelsohn Waiting for the Barbarians: Essays from the Classics to Pop Culture
2013 Franco Moretti Distant ReadingWinner [24] [25]
Mary Beard Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and InnovationsFinalist [26] [24]
Janet Malcolm Forty-One False Starts: Essays on Artists and Writers
Jonathan Franzen with Paul Reitter and Daniel Kehlman The Kraus Project: Essays by Karl Kraus
Hilton Als White Girls
2014 Ellen Willis , edited by Nona Willis Aronowitz The Essential Ellen WillisWinner [27] [28]
Claudia Rankine Citizen: An American Lyric Finalist [29] [27]
Vikram Chandra Geek Sublime: The Beauty of Code, the Code of Beauty
Eula Biss On Immunity: An Inoculation
Lynne Tillman What Would Lynne Tillman Do?
2015 Maggie Nelson The Argonauts Winner [30]
Ta-Nehisi Coates Between the World and Me Finalist [30]
Leo Damrosch Eternity's Sunrise: The Imaginative World of William Blake
Colm Tóibín On Elizabeth Bishop
James Wood The Nearest Thing to Life
2016 Carol Anderson White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial DivideWinner [31]
Mark Greif Against Everything: EssaysFinalist [31]
Peter Orner Am I Alone Here?: Notes on Living to Read and Reading to Live
Alice Kaplan Looking for The Stranger: Albert Camus and the Life of a Literary Classic
Olivia Laing The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone
2017 Carina Chocano You Play the Girl: On Playboy Bunnies, Stepford Wives, Train Wrecks, & Other Mixed MessagesWinner [32] [33] [34]
Kevin Young Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts and Fake News Finalist [32] [35]
Camille Dungy Guidebook to Relative Strangers: Journeys into Race, Motherhood, and History
Valeria Luiselli Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions
Edwidge Danticat The Art of Death: Writing the Final Story
2018 Zadie Smith Feel Free: Essays Winner [36] [37] [38] [39]
Robert Christgau Is It Still Good to Ya?: Fifty Years of Rock Criticism, 1967-2017Finalist [36]
Lacy M. Johnson The Reckonings: Essays
Terrance Hayes To Float in the Space Between: A Life and Work in Conversation with the Life and Work of Etheridge Knight
Stephen Greenblatt Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics
2019 Saidiya Hartman Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Stories of Social UpheavalWinner [40] [41]
Maria Tumarkin AxiomaticFinalist [40]
Lydia Davis Essays One
Hanif Abdurraqib Go Ahead in the Rain
Peter Schjeldahl Hot, Cold, Heavy, Light, 100 Art Writings 1988-2018
2020 Nicole R. Fleetwood Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass IncarcerationWinner [42] [43] [44]
Wendy A. Woloson Crap: A History of Cheap Stuff in AmericaFinalist [43]
Cristina Rivera Garza Grieving: Dispatches from a Wounded Country
Namwali Serpell Stranger Faces
Vivian Gornick Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader
2021 Melissa Febos GirlhoodWinner [45]
Mark McGurl Everything and Less: The Novel in the Age of AmazonFinalist [46] [47] [48]
Amia Srinivasan The Right To Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century
Jesse McCarthy Who Will Pay Reparations on My Soul?: Essays
Jenny DiskiWhy Didn't You Just Do What You Were Told?: Essays
2022 Timothy Bewes Free Indirect: The Novel in a Postfictional AgeWinner [49]
Rachel Aviv Strangers to Ourselves: Unsettled Minds and the Stories That Make UsFinalist [50]
Peter Brooks Seduced by Story: The Use and Abuse of Narrative
Margo Jefferson Constructing a Nervous System: A Memoir
Alia Trabucco Zerán (trans. by Sophie Hughes)When Women Kill: Four Crimes Retold
2023 Tina Post Deadpan: The Aesthetics of Black InexpressionWinner
Grace Lavery Pleasure and Efficacy: Of Pen Names, Cover Versions, and Other Trans TechniquesFinalist [51]
Naomi Klein Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World
Myriam Gurba Creep: Accusations and Confessions
Nicholas Dames The Chapter: A Segmented History from Antiquity to the Twenty-First Century

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References

  1. ↑ "How We Pick Our Awards". National Book Critics Circle. Archived from the original on June 8, 2020. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  2. 1 2 "Frequently Asked Questions". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  3. ↑ "Membership". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  4. ↑ "2005". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  5. ↑ "2005". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  6. ↑ "2006". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2024-10-21.
  7. ↑ "National Book Critics Circle Announces 2007 Award Winners". the American Booksellers Association. 2008-03-07. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  8. 1 2 "2007 NBCC Winners Announced". National Book Critics Circle. 2008-03-07. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  9. ↑ Rich, Motoko (2008-03-07). "National Book Critics Circle Awards". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  10. 1 2 "2008". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  11. ↑ Magee, C. Max (2009-01-25). "2008 National Book Critics Circle Finalists Announced". The Millions. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  12. 1 2 "2009". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  13. ↑ "2009 National Book Critics Circle Awards Ceremony". C-SPAN. 2010-03-10. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  14. ↑ Reid, Calvin (2010-03-12). "Mantel, Holmes, Biss Among 2009 National Book Critics Circle Winners". PublishersWeekly.com. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  15. 1 2 "2010". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  16. ↑ Magee, C. Max (2011-03-11). "2010 National Book Critics Circle Award Winners Announced". The Millions. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  17. 1 2 "2011". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  18. 1 2 "The National Book Critics Circle Awards 2011". Book Reporter. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  19. ↑ Magee, C. Max (2012-01-22). "2011 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists Announced". The Millions. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  20. 1 2 "2012". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  21. ↑ Habash, Gabe (2013-02-28). "2012 National Book Critics Circle Awards Go to 'Billy Lynn,' Solomon, Caro". PublishersWeekly.com. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  22. ↑ "National Book Critics Awards Shortlist Announced". HuffPost. 2013-01-14. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  23. ↑ "2012 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists Announced". The Millions. 2013-01-14. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  24. 1 2 "2013". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  25. ↑ Magee, C. Max (2014-03-13). "2013 National Book Critics Circle Award Winners Announced". The Millions. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  26. ↑ "2013 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists Announced". The Millions. 2014-01-14. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  27. 1 2 "2014". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  28. ↑ Schaub, Michael (13 March 2015). "2014 National Book Critics Circle Award winners announced". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  29. ↑ Schaub, Michael (2015-01-19). "National Book Critics Circle announces 2014 awards finalists". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  30. 1 2 "2015". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  31. 1 2 "2016". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  32. 1 2 "2017". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  33. ↑ "2017 National Book Critics Circle Award Winners". The Millions. 2018-03-15. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  34. ↑ Colyard, K. W. (2018-03-16). "The National Book Critics Circle Award Winners For 2017 Are All Women & You'll Want To Read All Their Books". Bustle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  35. ↑ Temple, Emily (2018-01-22). "Here are the Finalists for the 2017 National Book Critics Circle Awards". Literary Hub. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  36. 1 2 "2018". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  37. ↑ Squires, Bethy (2019-03-14). "National Book Critics Circle Winners Include New York's Christopher Bonanos". Vulture. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  38. ↑ van Koeverden, Jane (2019-03-15). "Anna Burns, Zadie Smith among 2018 National Book Critics Circle Award winners". CBC Books. Retrieved 2022-01-24.
  39. ↑ "Congratulations to the 2019 National Book Critics Circle Award Winners". Book Marks. 2019-03-15. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  40. 1 2 "2019". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  41. ↑ Reiter, Amy (2020-03-13). "National Book Critics Circle Announces 2019 Awards". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  42. ↑ Beer, Tom (2021-03-25). "National Book Critics Circle Presents Awards". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  43. 1 2 "2020". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  44. ↑ "National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction Winners". Powell's Books. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  45. ↑ Beer, Tom (2022-03-17). "NBCC Award Winners Revealed at Virtual Ceremony". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  46. ↑ Bancroft, Colette (2022-01-21). "National Book Critics Circle announces awards finalists". Tampa Bay Times. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  47. ↑ Beer, Tom (2022-01-20). "Finalists for the 2022 NBCC Awards Are Announced". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  48. ↑ "2021 National Book Critics Circle Awards". Locus Online. 2022-01-21. Retrieved 2022-01-25.
  49. ↑ Varno, David (2023-03-24). "Announcing the 2022 NBCC Award Winners". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2023-03-24.
  50. ↑ Labrise, Megan (2023-01-31). "NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE ANNOUNCES FINALISTS FOR PUBLISHING YEAR 2022". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2022-03-24.
  51. ↑ Stewart, Sophia (January 25, 2024). "2024 National Book Critics Circle Awards Finalists Announced". Publishers Weekly . Retrieved July 6, 2024.
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