Jesmyn Ward, a Mississippi author whose academic career includes a stint teaching at the University of South Alabama, has become the youngest person ever to win the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction.
It’s hardly the first major recognition for Ward, 45, who was born in California and grew up in coastal Mississippi. In 2011, a few months after she began teaching creative nonfiction at USA, her second novel, “Salvage the Bones,” won the National Book Award for Fiction. She won that award again in 2017 for “Sing, Unburied, Sing.” She also was awarded a MacArthur “genius grant” in 2017. Since 2014 she has been a professor of creative writing at Tulane University.
“Jesmyn Ward’s literary vision continues to become more expansive and piercing, addressing urgent questions about racism and social injustice being voiced by Americans,” said Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. “Jesmyn’s writing is precise yet magical, and I am pleased to recognize her contributions to literature with this prize.”
According to information released by the Library of Congress, Hayden selected Ward as the winner “based on nominations from more than 60 distinguished literary figures, including former winners of the prize, acclaimed authors and literary critics from around the world.”
The Library describes the award as one that honors “an American literary writer whose body of work is distinguished not only for its mastery of the art but also for its originality of thought and imagination.”
“I am deeply honored to receive this award, not only because it aligns my work with legendary company, but because it also recognizes the difficulty and rigour of meeting America on the page, of appraising her as a lover would: clear-eyed, open-hearted, keen to empathize and connect,” said Ward, in a statement released by the Library of Congress. “This is our calling, and I am grateful for it.”
