The Putlizer Prize winners were announced on Monday. The Pulitzer Prize is named in honor of Joseph Pulitzer, a newspaper publisher in the late 19th century. The awards were established in 1917 and are governed by the Pulitzer Prize Board and awarded by Columbia University. Awards are given in 21 categories for journalism, drama, music, and letters.
The 2008 winners include:
Fiction
Junot Díaz. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight ghetto nerd, a New Jersey romantic who dreams of becoming the Dominican J.R.R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the fuku - the ancient curse that has haunted Oscar's family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still dreaming of his first kiss, is only its most recent victim - until the fateful summer that he decides to be its last. ~Book jacket
History
Daniel Walker Howe. What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848
This authoritative addition to Oxford's "History of the United States" series is a product of synthesis and astute analysis. Intellectual and cultural historian Howe (Making the American Self: Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln) touches upon the rapidly expanding nation's economy, foreign relations, and social structures, taking into account race, gender, and ethnicity, and bringing special insights to his discussion of religious revivals and the evolution of moral consciousness, reform movements, and political institutions. The evocative title, which was the first message carried by Morse's telegraph, refers to the changes wrought by religious sensibilities as well as those wrought by technological breakthroughs.
Biography
John Matteson. Eden's Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and her Father
Louisa May Alcott's name is known universally. Yet, during her youth, the famous Alcott was her father, Bronson - an eminent teacher and lecturer and an admired friend of Emerson and Thoreau. He desired perfection, both, for the world and from his family. Willful and exuberant, Louisa was anything but the model daughter. While her three sisters more readily won Bronson's favor, Louisa puzzled and appalled him with her mercurial moods and restless yearnings for money and fame, The other prize she deeply coveted - her father's understanding -seemed the hardest of all to win. ~Book jacket
Poetry
Robert Hass. Time and Materials: Poems, 1997-2005
In his first poetry collection in a decade, former poet laureate Hass is in great form, simultaneously blithe and commanding.
General Nonfiction
Saul Friedländer.The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945
This multifaceted study - at all levels and in different places - enhances the perception of the magnitude, complexity, and interrelatedness of the many components of this history. Based on a vast array of documents and an overwhelming choir of voices - mainly from diaries, letters, and memoirs - Saul Friedlander avoids domesticating the memory of these unprecedented and horrific events. The convergence of these various aspects gives a unique quality to The Years of Extermination. ~Book jacket
Please also see the past Putlitzer winners in Biography or Autobiography, Drama, Fiction, General Nonfiction, History, Poetry and Special Citations and Awards - Letters.
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Richard Morgan. 
Michael Chabon. 
John Hart. 
Katherine Marsh. 
