2019 National Book Award Winners Announced

The winners of the 2019 National Book Awards have been announced! In his rousing speech to open the 70th National Book Awards, acclaimed literary advocate and host LeVar Burton stated, “It is storytelling that holds our civilization together.” And in a year where none of the 25 finalists had previously won a National Book Award and the majority of the finalists were first time nominees, it was a night of storytelling, of new stories—a night where the winners told their stories of how they came to be there, the struggles and inspirations, and people along the way.

Winner of the nonfiction award for her memoir The Yellow House, Sarah M. Broom spoke movingly of her mother and her presence in Broom’s life and memoir. And Hungarian novelist László Krasznahorkai, winner of the translated literature award now in its second year in this iteration, thanked the foundation for the creation of the award and his translator Ottilie Mulzet, saying that through translators international writers can also “be at home in America.”

Among the other stories told was that of Oren J. Teicher, chief executive at the American Booksellers Association, who won this year’s Literarian Award for service to the wider literary community. The award was presented by author and bookstore co-owner Ann Patchett who remarked on Teicher’s tradition of working at the counters of various independent bookstores during the busy holiday season. And novelist and activist Edmund White who won the award for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, a lifetime achievement award, for his pioneering contributions to gay literature. His award was presented by the author and director John Waters.