2017 Pulitzer Prizewinners in Literature

The Pulitzer Prize is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine and online journalism, literature, and musical composition in the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of American (Hungarian-born) Joseph Pulitzer who had made his fortune as a newspaper publisher.  It is administered by Columbia University in New York City.  Prizes are awarded yearly in twenty-one categories. In twenty of the categories, each winner receives a certificate and a $15,000 cash award.  Winners for 2017 in the literature category include:

Fiction
The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
After Cora, a slave in pre-Civil War Georgia, escapes with another slave, Caesar, they seek the help of the Underground Railroad as they flee from state to state and try to evade a slave catcher, Ridgeway, who is determined to return them to the South.

Finalists: Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett; The Sport of Kings by C. E. Morgan

History
Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson
An all-encompassing account of the infamous 1971 Attica prison uprising, the state’s violent response and the victims’ decades-long quest for justice draws on previously unreleased information while detailing how the event has influenced civil rights practices in the criminal justice system.

Finalists: Brothers at Arms: American Independence and the Men of France and Spain Who Saved It by Larrie D. Ferreiro; New England Bound: Slavery and Colonization in Early America by Wendy Warren

Biography or Autobiography
The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar
Twenty-two years after his father disappeared under mysterious circumstances, Hisham Matar returned to his native Libya in search of the truth behind the disappearance.

Finalists: In the Darkroom by Susan Faludi; When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi

General Nonfiction
Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond
A Harvard sociologist examines the under-represented challenge of eviction as a formidable cause of poverty in America, revealing how millions of people are wrongly forced from their homes and reduced to cycles of extreme disadvantage that are reinforced by dysfunctional legal systems.

Finalists: In a Different Key: The Story of Autism by John Donavan and Caren Zucker; Honor in Arlington National Cemetery by Micki Mcelya