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PRIZE-WINNING BOOKS ONLINE

In this exhibit, you can read online the complete text of books that have won major literary prizes, like the Newbery Award, the Nobel Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize. The books listed below are either out of copyright (at least in some countries), or are online with the permission of the copyright holder. Please inform us of any bad links.

Newbery Award

The Newbery award for outstanding children's books by Americans was established in 1922. Each year a medal is given to a book published the previous year. In most years, Honor Books are designated as well. More information, including information on recent winners, can be found at the official Newbery Medal Home Page. Due to copyright restrictions, we cannot yet be complete for subsequent years of the Newbery awards. The following later Newbery awardees are online:

Nobel Prize in Literature

The Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded to an author from any country who has produced "the most outstanding work of an idealistic tendency", was established in 1901. The prize is given to an author, and does not usually cite individual books. Winning authors with books freely readable online are listed below; select the link on the author's name to see books by the author, and possibly to see links to books and other information about the author as well.

For more information on the Nobel Prize, including information on recent winners, see the official Nobel Prize web site.

Due to copyright restrictions, we cannot yet list books online for all subsequent years of the Nobel prizes. However, the following later Nobel awardees have free books online.

Pulitzer Prizes

The Pulitzer Prizes were established in 1917, with awards for journalism and literature. The early literature prize categories were American biography, drama, fiction, history, and poetry. For more information on the Pulitzer Prize, including full lists of winners, see the official Pulitzer Prize web site.

Journalism

Most of the journalism prizes have been awarded to articles and photographs in newspapers. As digitized newspapers come on line, we may link to some of the early winners. Full texts of many of the recent journalism winners are linked from the official Pulitzer journalism prize listings.

A one-time prize for newspaper history was awarded in 1918 for the following essay:

A special citation was awarded posthumously in 2020 for the reporting of Ida B. Wells.

Biography

Except where noted, the subject of each biography is either the person mentioned in the title, or the author.

Drama

Fiction

History

Poetry

We have not yet determined whether any later Pulitzer Prize-winning books can go online, but we expect to add links for some of them to these lists in early 2025.

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Edited by John Mark Ockerbloom (onlinebooks@pobox.upenn.edu)
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