The Harold Washington Literary Award recognizes diverse and stimulating authors who address issues of contemporary life and whose literary achievements include a significant body of work that has touched the public mind and imagination. Harold Washington, the first African-American mayor of the City of Chicago, revered literature and epitomized the diversity of the American experience. The award, which bears his name, celebrates this spirit. The goal of this award is to present examples to the public of creative uses of the written word.

Recipients of this prestigious award are selected by a cross-cultural committee of representatives from Chicago’s literary community.

This award has been given annually since 1989 by Near South Planning Board at the Harold Washington Literary Award Dinner.

2023 Honoree: Isabel Wilkerson

Pulitzer Prize winner and National Humanities Medal recipient Isabel Wilkerson is the author of The New York Times bestsellers and critically-acclaimed Caste and National Book Critics Circle Award winner The Warmth of Other Suns. A gifted storyteller, Wilkerson captivates audiences with the universal human story of migration and reinvention, as well as the enduring search for the American dream.

For more information on Isabel Wilkerson, please visit www.prhspeakers.com

Past Recipients of the HWLA

Natasha Tretheway (2022)

Ta-Nehisi Coates (2021)

Alex Kotlowitz (2019)

Rabih Alameddine (2018)

Rita Dove (2017)
Marilynne Robinson (2016)
Edward P. Jones (2015)
Stuart Dybek (2014)
Art Spiegelman (2013)
Sara Paretsky (2012)
Edwidge Danticat (2011)
Barbara Ehrenreich (2010)
Dave Eggers (2009)
Scott Turow (2008)
Walter Mosley (2007)
E.L. Doctorow (2006)
Garrison Keillor (2005)
Jules Feiffer (2004)
Margaret Atwood (2003)
Grace Paley (2002)
August Wilson (2001)
John Hope Franklin (2000)
Robert Pinsky (1999)
Joseph Epstein (1998)
Cynthia Ozick (1997)
Isabel Allende (1996)
Doris Kearns Goodwin (1995)
Zbigniew Brzezinski (1994)
Garry Wills (1993)
Ralph Ellison (1992)
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1991)
Saul Bellow, Ray Bradbury, Gwendolyn Brooks, Cyrus Colter, William
Maxwell, Studs Terkel (1990)
Susan Sontag (1989)