Miles Franklin Award


The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases". The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin, who is best known for writing the Australian classic My Brilliant Career. She bequeathed her estate to fund this award. As of 2025, the award is valued at A$60,000.
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Winners, old dating convention

The prize originally took its date from the year in which eligible novels were published, ignoring the fact that it was not awarded until the following year.

Winners, new dating convention

The prize is still for the best novel published during the preceding year, but now bears the date of the year in which it is awarded. While the change meant there was no prize called "1988", there is no break in the annual series. The award for novels published in 1987 was announced on 10 May 1988 as the "1987" prize, and the award for novels published in 1988 was announced on 25 July 1989 as the "1989" prize.

Controversies

Author Frank Moorhouse was disqualified from consideration for his novel Grand Days because the story was set in Europe during the 1920s and was not sufficiently Australian.
1995 winner Helen Darville, also known as Helen Demidenko and Helen Dale, won for The Hand That Signed the Paper and sparked a debate about authenticity in Australian literature. Darville claimed to be of Ukrainian descent and said it was fiction based on family history. Writer David Marr, who presented the award to her, said that revelations about her true background did not "alter a single thing about the quality of the story, it knocks completely out of the water her answers to critics who said it was not historically accurate, that she knows because of direct family experience, which appears to be complete bull----."
Even before the hoax was revealed, Darville’s book was considered anti-Semitic and justified the genocide of Jewish people. It was also later revealed that she plagiarised from multiple sources.
In 2004, three judges resigned due to what they viewed as the commodification of the awards.
2022 longlisted writer John Hughes was accused of plagiarising significant sections of his 2021 book The Dogs from Nobel Laureate Svetlana Alexievich's nonfiction book The Unwomanly Face of War. Nearly 60 similarities and identical sentences were found in a comparison of Hughes' novel and the English version of Alexievich's book. The Guardian newspaper also found similarities between incidents described in the books, including the central scene from which The Dogs takes its title. Further investigation found other examples of plagiarism in the novel and that Hughes copied sections of classic texts including The Great Gatsby and Anna Karenina without acknowledging the original source. The book was subsequently withdrawn from competition.
The Stella Prize was created in 2013 as a reaction to the supposed under-representation of women as winners of literary prizes, in particular the 2011 Miles Franklin Award shortlist. However, since 2013, only three men have won the Miles Franklin Award.

Repeat winners

Shortlisted works

Shortlisted titles are only shown for the years 1987 onwards. No record has yet been found for any shortlists being released prior to that year.

1980s

In 1989, the date by which the prize is identified changed from the year of publication to the year of announcement. While there was no award called "1988", there is no break in the annual series.
YearAuthorTitleResult
1987
for novels published in 1987,
announced in 1988		Dancing on CoralWinner
1987
for novels published in 1987,
announced in 1988		Holden's PerformanceShortlist
1987
for novels published in 1987,
announced in 1988		Truant StateShortlist
1987
for novels published in 1987,
announced in 1988		BloodfatherShortlist
1987
for novels published in 1987,
announced in 1988		Home Is the SailorShortlist
1989
for novels published in 1988,
announced in 1989		Oscar and LucindaWinner
1989
for novels published in 1988,
announced in 1989		Captivity CaptiveShortlist
1989
for novels published in 1988,
announced in 1989		Out of the Line of FireShortlist
1989
for novels published in 1988,
announced in 1989		Building on SandShortlist
1989
for novels published in 1988,
announced in 1989		CharadesShortlist

Longlisted works

Longlisted titles are only shown for the years 2005 onwards. That was the first year that such a list was released by the judging panel. The number of works included on the longlist varies from year to year.

2005–2009

2005
2006
2007
2008
2009

2010–2019

2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016Ghost River, Tony Birch Coming Rain, Stephen DaisleyHope Farm, Peggy FrewLeap, Myfanwy JonesThe World Without Us, Mireille JuchauThe Hands : An Australian Pastoral, Stephen OrrBlack Rock White City, A. S. PatrićSalt Creek, Lucy TreloarThe Natural Way of Things, Charlotte Wood
2017
2018
2019The Lebs, Michael Mohammed Ahmad Flames, Robbie Arnott Boy Swallows Universe, Trent Dalton A Sand Archive, Gregory Day Inappropriation, Lexi Freiman A Stolen Season, Rodney Hall The Death of Noah Glass, Gail Jones Too Much Lip, Melissa Lucashenko Dyschronia, Jennifer Mills The Lucky Galah, Tracy Sorensen

2020–

2020The White Girl, Tony Birch Room For a Stranger, Melanie Cheng Islands, Peggy Frew No One, John Hughes Act of Grace, Anna Krien A Season on Earth, Gerald Murnane The Returns, Philip Salom Exploded View, Carrie Tiffany The Yield, Tara June Winch The Weekend, Charlotte Wood
2021Amnesty, Aravind Adiga The Rain Heron, Robbie Arnott Our Shadows, Gail Jones Infinite Splendours, Sofie Laguna The Labyrinth, Amanda Lohrey The Animals in That Country, Laura Jean McKay Lucky’s, Andrew Pippos Stone Sky Gold Mountain, Mirandi Riwoe The Fifth Season, Philip Salom Song of the Crocodile, Nardi Simpson The Inland Sea, Madeleine Watts At the Edge of the Solid World, Daniel Davis Wood
2022The Other Half of You, Michael Mohammed Ahmad After Story, Larissa Behrendt Scary Monsters, Michelle de Kretser Bodies of Light, Jennifer Down Echolalia, Briohny Doyle The Magpie Wing, Max Easton The Airways, Jennifer Mills One Hundred Days, Alice Pung The Performance, Claire Thomas 7 ½, Christos Tsiolkas Grimmish, Michael Winkler
2023Hopeless Kingdom, Kgshak Akec Limberlost, Robbie Arnott Cold Enough for Snow, Jessica Au Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens, Shankari Chandran Enclave, Claire G. Coleman Losing Face, George Haddad Forty Nights, Pirooz Jafari Madukka: The River Serpent, Julie JansonThe Lovers, Yumna Kassab Iris, Fiona Kelly McGregor Waypoints, Adam Ouston
2024Only Sound Remains, Hossein Asgari Wall, Jen Craig Strangers at the Port, Lauren Aimee Curtis Anam, André Dao The Bell of the World, Gregory Day Edenglassie, Melissa Lucashenko The Sitter, Angela O'Keeffe Hospital, Sanya Rushdi Stone Yard Devotional, Charlotte Wood Praiseworthy, Alexis Wright
2025Chinese Postman, Brian Castro The Burrow, Melanie Cheng Theory & Practice, Michelle de Kretser Dirt Poor Islanders, Winnie Dunn Compassion, Julie Janson Politica, Yumna Kassab Ghost Cities, Siang Lu Highway 13, Fiona McFarlane The Degenerates, Raeden Richardson Juice, Tim Winton