BPL Announces 2018 Literary Prize Winners
The BPL announced on Monday the winners of the fourth annual Brooklyn Public Library Literary Prize. Jeanne Theoharis was awarded the 2018 Nonfiction Prize for A More Beautiful and Terrible History: The Uses and Misuses of Civil Rights History and Carmen Maria Machado received the 2018 Fiction & Poetry Prize for her debut short story collection Her Body and Other Parties.
“The Brooklyn Public Library Literary Prize celebrates the relationship between writers and librarians, both critical figures in our society,” BPL President and CEO Linda E. Johnson said in the announcement. “Drawing on their extensive knowledge of contemporary literature and representing Brooklyn’s avid readers, our librarians are thrilled to honor Ms. Machado and Dr. Theoharis’s vital books.”
Each year a panel of librarians throughout BPL’s 59 branches compiles a list of nominees based on their knowledge of literature and contemporary writing as well as their experience working with library patrons. This year’s selection committee was made up of eight librarians who specialize in subjects ranging from adult literature, business, and historical collections. The committee also included two members of the Brooklyn Eagles—a group that supports the Brooklyn Public Library system by raising funds, hosting events, and promoting the resources library branches offer. See the shortlist of this year’s nominees here.
“The Brooklyn Eagles are pleased to honor Jeanne Theoharis with the Brooklyn Public Library Literary Prize for nonfiction,” said Charles Duhigg, Nonfiction Prize Committee Co-Chair and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of The Power of Habit and Smarter Faster Better.
“Her extraordinary and timely work reflects the library’s founding mission to ‘improve the quality of the minds of the people,’ challenging us to reconsider all we know about the civil rights movement and the work that remains to be done in this profound study of our nation’s history,” he added.
Machado’s short stories will be adapted into an anthology series for FX. “In her outstanding debut short story collection, Carmen Maria Machado—in an utterly compelling and original voice—tackles difficult subjects head on including sexual desire, female subjugation and violence,” said Ashley Mihlebach, Fiction Prize Committee Co-Chair and National Account Manager for HarperCollins.
The BPL Literary Prize is one of the few major literature prizes selected by librarians and awarded by a public library system. Theoharis and Machado will accept their $5,000 awards on Friday, November 2 at the Brooklyn Classic, the Brooklyn Eagles’ annual fundraising event held at the Park Slope Library.