Barbara Kingsolver. Image: National Book Foundation, Evan Kafka
By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson
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US National Book Award: Opening to Non-US Citizens
The US National Book Foundation Issues US$350,000 in Hawthornden Grants
Vast Impact on the National and Global Literary Landscape
Having reported Wednesday (September 4) on the National Book Foundation‘s selection of publisher W. Paul Coates to be the recipient of its 2024 Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community, we today (September 9) have news that the program’s second of two annual lifetime achievement honors will go to HarperCollins author Barbara Kingsolver for her “exceptional writing and authenticity.”
Kingsolver’s award is called the National Book Foundation’s Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and it places her in the company some of the States’ most celebrated modern-era writers including Isabel Allende, Robert A. Caro, John Ashbery, Ursula K. Le Guin, Toni Morrison, Adrienne Rich, Karen Tei Yamashita, Art Spiegelman, Walter Mosley, Edmund White, and most recently, Rita Dove.
Like Coates, Kingsolver will be honored formally at the November 20 annual National Book Awards’ fundraising winners’ ceremony at Cipriani Wall Street in New York City, and her accolade carries a US$10,000 purse and a medal.
Sam Stoloff. Image: National Book Foundation, Kristin Boncher Photography
At the event in November, she’ll be presented Sam Stoloff, president and principal of the Frances Goldin Literary Agency.
Kingsolver is singularly positioned among the country’s most prominent writers, one who has approached the American and international markets with works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, investigative journalism, and science writing.
For many, her 2009 The Lacuna was a revelatory, definitional novel that animates Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Lev (Leon) Trotsky in the era of J. Edgar Hoover.
Five novels had preceded that one, as had a collection of short stories.
By the time Demon Copperhead had appeared in 2022, its title’s echo of David Copperfield no accident—drawing to her the Pulitzer Prize in the States and the Women’s Prize for Fiction in the United Kingdom—it was becoming evident that Barbara Kingsolver has an unusual gift of empathy for male characters, especially younger, struggling souls whose frequently dismissed promise is as radiant as her prose. This is especially significant in the United States’ publishing industry with its consumer base led by women over men and a workforce assessed by Lee & Low’s studies at between 70- and 80-percent female.
Between The Lacuna and Demon Copperhead, the novel Flight Behavior (2012) arrived from Kingsolver-the-scientist: she holds a master’s degree from the University of Arizona in ecology and evolutionary biology. A parable of crises both in our climate and our power struggles, Unsheltered (2018) explored a culture’s love-hate relationship with the revelations of science and the drivers of preservation.
David Steinberger
Announcing Kingsolver as the 2024 Distinguished Contribution laureate, National Book Foundation board chair David Steinberger (chair and CEO of Open Road Integrated Media) is quoted, saying, “Spanning genres, Barbara Kingsolver’s exceptional writing and authenticity, on and off the page, has inspired generations of writers and readers.
“Kingsolver’s books—which have been translated into dozens of languages—have had a vast impact on the national and global literary landscape, and it’s our profound honor to present her with this lifetime achievement award at the 75th anniversary of the National Book Awards.”
‘We Have All Benefited From Her Brilliance’
A native of Annapolis, Maryland, Kingsolver was raised in rural Kentucky and lives in Appalachian Virginia. Her distinctive voice may be the culture’s most sophisticated defense yet of a rural America preyed on by election-season politicians and corporate charlatans.
Ruth Dickey
In her comment on the announcement of Kingsolver’s award, National Book Foundation executive director Ruth Dickey says, “Barbara Kingsolver’s writing embraces the personal and the political, examining complex issues of social justice, exalting the natural world, and exploring progressive social change with care and specificity.
“For Kingsolver, writing is a tool for community activism—a way of shining a light on some of the most intricate environmental and social injustices of our time, and an art form through which she can share stories of her beloved Appalachia with the world.
“We have all benefited from her brilliance, and it’s a gift to celebrate her remarkable literary accomplishments with the 2024 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.”
Kingsolver is the 37th recipient of this award, which was created in 1988. Nominations for the medal are made by former National Book Award winners, finalists, jurors, and other writers and literary professionals from around the country. The final selection is made by the National Book Foundation’s board.
More from Publishing Perspectives on the National Book Awards in the United States is here and more on the vast field of international book awards and prizes is here. More from us on the United States’ market is here.