Announcing the 2021 Pen America Literary Awards Longlists

PEN America is honored to announce the longlists for the 2021 PEN America Literary Awards. Our awards are juried by panels of esteemed, award-winning writers, editors, translators, and critics. These authors are committed to recognizing their contemporaries, from promising debut writers to those who have had a continuous, lasting impact on literary excellence. You can learn more about the 2021 PEN America Literary Awards judges here.

The 2021 PEN America Literary Awards will confer over $380,000 to writers and translators. Spanning fiction, nonfiction, poetry, biography, essay, science writing, translation, and more, these longlisted books are dynamic, diverse, and thought-provoking examples of literary excellence.

Finalists for all book awards will be announced in February 2021. Stay tuned for more. See the full list of nominees at Pen America.