National Book Award for Nonfiction
The National Book Award for Nonfiction is one of five US annual National Book Awards, which are given by the National Book Foundation to recognize outstanding literary work by US citizens. They are awards "by writers to writers". The panelists are five "writers who are known to be doing great work in their genre or field".
The original National Book Awards recognized the "Most Distinguished" biography and nonfiction books of 1935 and 1936, and the "Favorite" nonfiction books of 1937 to 1940. The "Bookseller Discovery" and the "Most Original Book" sometimes recognized nonfiction.
The general "Nonfiction" award was one of three when the National Book Awards were re-established in 1950 for 1949 publications, which the National Book Foundation considers the origin of its current Awards series.
From 1964 to 1983, under different administrators, there were multiple nonfiction categories.
The current Nonfiction award recognizes one book written by a U.S. citizen and published in the U.S. from December 1 to November 30. The National Book Foundation accepts nominations from publishers until June 15, requires mailing nominated books to the panelists by August 1, and announces five finalists in October. The winner is announced on the day of the final ceremony in November. The award is $10,000 and a bronze sculpture; other finalists get $1000, a medal, and a citation written by the panel.
The sculpture by Louise Nevelson dates from the 1980 awards. The $10,000 and $1000 cash prizes and autumn recognition for current-year publications date from 1984.
About 200 books were nominated for the 1984 award when the single award for general nonfiction was restored.
Multiple nonfiction categories (1964–1983)
For the 1963/1964 cycle, three new award categories replaced "Nonfiction": Arts and Letters; History and Biography; Science, Philosophy and Religion. For the next twenty years there were at least three award categories for nonfiction books marketed to adult readers and the term "Nonfiction" was used only 1980 to 1983.| timespan | of all awards | list of "Nonfiction" categories covered [|below] |
| 1964–1966 | 3 of 5 | Arts and Letters; History and Biography; Science, Philosophy and Religion |
| 1967–1968 | 3 of 6 | Arts and Letters; History and Biography; Science, Philosophy and Religion |
| 1969–1971 | 3 of 7 | Arts and Letters; History and Biography; "The Sciences" or "Philosophy and Religion" alternating |
| 1972–1975 | 6 of 10 | Arts and Letters; Biography; Contemporary Affairs; History; Philosophy and Religion; The Sciences |
| 1976 | 3 of 6 | Arts and Letters; Contemporary Affairs; History and biography |
| 1980 | 16 of 30+ | Autobiography; Biography; Current Interest; General Nonfiction; History; Religion/Inspiration; Science |
| 1977–1979 | 3 of 7 | Biography and Autobiography; Contemporary Thought; History |
| 1981–1983 | 8 of 20+ | Autobiography/Biography; General Nonfiction; History; Science |
Recipients
1935–1940
The National Book Awards for 1935 to 1940 annually recognized the "most distinguished" or "favorite" book of General Nonfiction or simply Nonfiction. In 1935 and 1936 there was distinct award to the most distinguished Biography; both winners were autobiographies. Meanwhile, four of the six general nonfiction winners were autobiographical and one more was a biography. Furthermore, all books were eligible for the "Bookseller Discovery" and "Most Original Book" ; nonfiction winners are listed here. In 1937 and 1939 alone, the New York Times reported close seconds and runners up respectively.There was only one National Book Award for 1941, the Bookseller Discovery, which recognized a novel; then none until their 1950 revival for 1949 books in three categories including general Nonfiction.
| Year | Category | Author | Title | Result | |
| 1935 | Nonfiction | Anne Morrow Lindbergh | North to the Orient | Winner | |
| 1935 | Nonfiction | Vincent Sheean | Personal History | Finalist | |
| 1936 | Most Original Book | Della T. Lutes | The Country Kitchen | Winner | |
| 1936 | Nonfiction | Van Wyck Brooks | The Flowering of New England: 1815–1865 | Winner | |
| 1937 | Most Original Book | Carl Crow | Four Hundred Million Customers: The Experiences—Some Happy, Some Sad, of an American Living in China, and What They Taught Him | Winner | |
| 1937 | Nonfiction | Ève Curie | Madame Curie | Winner | |
| 1937 | Nonfiction | Lin Yutang | The Importance of Living | Finalist | |
| 1938 | Bookseller Discovery | David Fairchild | The World Was My Garden: Travels of a Plant Explorer | Winner | |
| 1938 | Most Original Book | Margaret Halsey | With Malice Toward Some | Winner | |
| 1938 | Nonfiction | Anne Morrow Lindbergh | Listen! The Wind | Winner | |
| 1939 | Nonfiction | Antoine de Saint-Exupéry | Wind, Sand and Stars | Winner | |
| 1939 | Nonfiction | Pierre van Paassen | Days of Our Years | Finalist | |
| 1940 | Bookseller Discovery | Perry Burgess | Who Walk Alone | Winner | |
| 1940 | Nonfiction | Hans Zinsser | As I Remember Him: The Biography of R.S. | Winner |
1950s
The first awards in the current series were presented to the best books of 1949 at the annual convention dinner of the booksellers, book publishers, and book manufacturers in New York City, March 16, 1950. There were honorable mentions in the non-fiction category only.| Year | Author | Title | Subject | Result | |
| 1950 | Ralph L. Rusk | The Life of Ralph Waldo Emerson | Ralph Waldo Emerson, American philosopher, essayist, and poet | Winner | |
| 1950 | Lincoln Barnett | The Universe and Dr. Einstein | Finalist | ||
| 1950 | Harry Allen Overstreet | The Mature Mind | Finalist | ||
| 1950 | Eleanor Roosevelt | This I Remember | Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, diplomat, and activist | Finalist | |
| 1950 | Lillian Smith | Killers of the Dream | Finalist | ||
| 1950 | Kenneth P. Williams | Lincoln Finds a General | Finalist | ||
| 1951 | Newton Arvin | Herman Melville | Herman Melville, American writer and poet | Winner | |
| 1952 | Rachel Carson | The Sea Around Us | Winner | ||
| 1953 | Bernard De Voto, | The Course of Empire | Winner | ||
| 1954 | Bruce Catton | A Stillness at Appomattox | Winner | ||
| 1955 | Joseph Wood Krutch | The Measure of Man | Winner | ||
| 1956 | Herbert Kubly | An American in Italy | Winner | ||
| 1957 | George F. Kennan | Russia Leaves the War | Winner | ||
| 1958 | Catherine Drinker Bowen | The Lion and the Throne | Edward Coke, English lawyer and judge | Winner | |
| 1959 | J. Christopher Herold | Mistress to an Age: A Life of Madame de Staël | Madame de Staël, Swiss/French author | Winner |
1960s
1964–1969
From 1964 to 1969, winners were presented by specific categories. However, finalists were presented in one general nonfiction category. Individual categories of finalists have been guessed.Arts and Letters
History and Biography
Science, Philosophy and Religion
1970s
Throughout the 1970s, the National Book Award was separated into multiple categories.History, biography, and Autobiography
In some years, the History and Biography awards were combined, while in others, they were two separate categories.| Year | Category | Author | Title | Subject | Result |
| 1970 | History and biography | T. Harry William | Huey Long | Huey Long, American politician from Louisiana | Winner |
| 1970 | History and biography | Dean Acheson | Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department | Dean Acheson, American politician and lawyer | Finalist |
| 1970 | History and biography | Townsend Hoopes | The Limits of Intervention | Townsend Hoopes, American historian and government official | Finalist |
| 1970 | History and biography | John Womack | Zapata and the Mexican Revolution | Emiliano Zapata, Mexican revolutionary | Finalist |
| 1970 | History and biography | Gordon S. Wood | The Creation of the American Republic | Finalist | |
| 1971 | History and biography | James MacGregor Burns | Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom | Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States from 1933 to 1945 | Winner |
| 1971 | History and biography | David Herbert Donald | Charles Sumner and the Rights of Man | Charles Sumner, American abolitionist and statesman | Finalist |
| 1971 | History and biography | Andy Logan | Against the Evidence: The Becker-Rosenthal Affair | Rosenthal murder case, Murder of Herman Rosenthal and subsequent trial | Finalist |
| 1971 | History and biography | Dumas Malone | Jefferson the President: First Term, 1801–1805 | Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States from 1801 to 1809 | Finalist |
| 1971 | History and biography | C. L. Sulzberger | The Last of the Giants | Finalist | |
| 1972 | Biography | Joseph P. Lash | Eleanor and Franklin: The Story of Their Relationship, Based on Eleanor Roosevelt's Private Papers | Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, diplomat, and activist | Winner |
| 1972 | Biography | John Cody | After Great Pain: The Inner Life of Emily Dickinson | Emily Dickinson, American poet | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Emily Farnham | Charles Demuth: Behind A Laughing Mask | Charles Demuth, American painter | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | David Freeman Hawke | Benjamin Rush: Revolutionary Gadfly | Benjamin Rush, American Founding Father physician, educator, and author | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Ralph Ketcham | James Madison: A Biography | James Madison, President of the United States from 1809 to 1817 | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Harding Lemay | Inside, Looking Out: A Personal Memoir | Harding Lemay, American screenwriter | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | D'Arcy McNickle | Indian Man: A Life of Oliver La Farge | Oliver La Farge, American novelist | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Ronald Paulson | Hogarth: His Life, Art, and Times | William Hogarth, English artist and social critic | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Lacey Baldwin Smith | Henry VIII: The Mask of Royalty | Henry VIII, King of England from 1509 to 1547 | Finalist |
| 1972 | Biography | Barbara Tuchman | Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45 | Finalist | |
| 1972 | History | Allan Nevins | The Organized War, 1863–1864 and The Organized War to Victory, 1864–1865 | Winner | |
| 1973 | Biography | James Thomas Flexner | George Washington: Anguish and Farewell, 1793–1799 | George Washington, First president of the United States | Winner |
| 1973 | Biography | Ingrid Bengis | Combat in the Erogenous Zone: Writings on Love, Hate, and Sex | Finalist | |
| 1973 | Biography | Hortense Calisher | Herself | Hortense Calisher, American novelist | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Kenneth S. Davis | FDR: The Beckoning of Destiny, 1882–1928 | Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States from 1933 to 1945 | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Leon Edel | Henry James: The Master, 1901–1916 | Henry James, American-born British writer and literary critic | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Eleanor Flexner | Mary Wollstonecraft: A Biography | Mary Wollstonecraft, English writer and intellectual | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Nikki Giovanni | Gemini: An Extended Autobiographical Statement on My First Twenty-Five Years of Being A Black Poet | Nikki Giovanni, American poet, writer and activist | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | John Houseman | Run-Through | John Houseman, British-American actor and film producer | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Diane Johnson | Lesser Lives | Mary Ellen Meredith, British novelist and poet of the Victorian era | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | George F. Kennan | Memoirs, 1950–1963 | Finalist | |
| 1973 | Biography | Joseph P. Lash | Eleanor: The Years Alone | Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, diplomat, and activist | Finalist |
| 1973 | Biography | Margaret Mead | Blackberry Winter: My Earlier Years | Finalist | |
| 1973 | Biography | Peter Štanský and William Abrahams | The Unknown Orwell | George Orwell, English author and journalist | Finalist |
| 1973 | History | Robert Manson Myers | The Children of Pride: A True Story of Georgia and the Civil War | Charles Colcock Jones, American Presbyterian clergyman, educator, and planter | Winner |
| 1973 | History | Isaiah Trunk | Judenrat: The Jewish Councils in Eastern Europe under Nazi Occupation | Winner | |
| 1973 | History | James David Barber | The Presidential Character: Predicting Performance in the White House | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | John Diggins | Mussolini and Fascism: The View from America | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | Richard Dunn | Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624–1713 | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | Loren Graham | Science and Philosophy in the Soviet Union | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | David Lovejoy | The Glorious Revolution in America | Dominion of New England, English regional government in North America, 1686–1689 | Finalist |
| 1973 | History | Jerre Mangione | The Dream and the Deal: The Federal Writers Project, 1935–43 | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | Robert O. Paxton | Vichy France: Old Guard and New Order, 1940–1944 | Finalist | |
| 1973 | History | Edward E. Rice | Mao's Way | Finalist | |
| 1974 | Biography | John Leonard Clive | Thomas Babington Macaulay: The Shaping of the Historian | Thomas Babington Macaulay | Winner |
| 1974 | Biography | Douglas Day | Malcolm Lowry: A Biography | Malcolm Lowry | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | J. H. Adamson and H. F. Folland | Sir Harry Vane: His Life and Times | Henry Vane the Younger | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Robert V. Bruce | Bell: Alexander Graham Bell and The Conquest of Solitude | Alexander Graham Bell | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Stephen F. Cohen | Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution: A Political Biography, 1888–1938 | Finalist | |
| 1974 | Biography | Lester G. Crocker | Jean-Jacques Rousseau: The Prophetic Voice, Vol. II | Jean-Jacques Rousseau | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Myra Friedman | Buried Alive: The Biography of Janis Joplin | Janis Joplin | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | William H. Harbaugh | Lawyer's Lawyer: The Life of John W. Davis | John W. Davis | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Townsend Hoopes | The Devil and John Foster Dulles | Finalist | |
| 1974 | Biography | Louis Sheaffer | O'Neill Volume II: Son and Artist | Eugene O'Neill | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Kathryn Kish Sklar | Catherine Beecher | Catherine Beecher | Finalist |
| 1974 | Biography | Adam Ulam | Stalin | Joseph Stalin | Finalist |
| 1974 | History | John Leonard Clive | Thomas Babington Macaulay: The Shaping of the Historian | Thomas Babington Macaulay | Winner |
| 1974 | History | Ray Allen Billington | Frederick Jackson Turner: Historian, Teacher, Scholar | Frederick Jackson Turner | Finalist |
| 1974 | History | Daniel J. Boorstin | The Americans | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Frank Freidel | Franklin D. Roosevelt | Franklin D. Roosevelt | Finalist |
| 1974 | History | Lawrence M. Friedman | A History of American Law | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Frederic C. Lane | Venice: Maritime Republic | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Edward Pessen | Riches, Class and Power Before the Civil War | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Richard Slotkin | Regeneration Through Violence: the Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600–1860 | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Stephan Thernstrom | The Other Bostonians: Poverty and Progress in the American Metropolis, 1880–1970 | Finalist | |
| 1974 | History | Robert C. Tucker | Stalin as Revolutionary, 1879–1929: A Study in History and Personality | Finalist | |
| 1975 | Biography | Richard B. Sewall | The Life of Emily Dickinson | Emily Dickinson | Winner |
| 1975 | Biography | Richard Beeman | Patrick Henry: A Biography | Patrick Henry | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | Michael Collins | Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys | Finalist | |
| 1975 | Biography | Ben Maddow | Edward Weston: Fifty Years; The Definitive Volume of His Photographic Work | Edward Weston | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | James R. Mellow | Charmed Circle: Gertrude Stein and Company | Gertrude Stein | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | Francis Steegmuller | "Your Isadora": The Love Story of Isadora Duncan & Gordon Craig | Isadora Duncan and Gordon Craig | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | Wallace Stegner | The Uneasy Chair: A Biography of Bernard DeVoto | Bernard DeVoto | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | Richard M. Sudhalter and Philip R. Evans | Bix: Man and Legend | Bix Beiderbecke | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | Glenn Watkins | Gesualdo: The Man and His Music | Carlo Gesualdo | Finalist |
| 1975 | Biography | James A. Weisheipl | Friar Thomas D'Aquino: his life, thought, and work | Thomas Aquinas | Finalist |
| 1975 | History | Bernard Bailyn | The Ordeal of Thomas Hutchinson | Winner | |
| 1975 | History | Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum | Salem Possessed: The Social Origins of Witchcraft | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Robert Brentano | Rome Before Avignon | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Shelby Foote | The Civil War: A Narrative | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Eugene D. Genovese | Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | John R. Gillis | Youth and History: Tradition and Change in European Age Relations, 1750–Present | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Erich S. Gruen | The Last Generation of the Roman Republic | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Christopher H. Johnson | Utopian Communism in France | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Gerald H. Meaker | The Revolutionary Left in Spain | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Edward Shorter and Charles Tilly | Strikes in France, 1830–1968 | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Mira Wilkins | The Maturing of Multinational Enterprise | Finalist | |
| 1975 | History | Peter H. Wood | Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670 through the Stono Rebellion | Finalist | |
| 1976 | History and Biography | David Brion Davis | The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 1770–1823 | Winner | |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Paul Horgan | Lamy of Santa Fe | Jean Baptiste Lamy | Finalist |
| 1976 | History and Biography | R. W. B. Lewis | Edith Wharton | Edith Wharton | Finalist |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Charles S. Maier | Recasting Bourgeois Europe: Stabilization in France, Germany and Italy in the Decade after World War | Finalist | |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Edmund S. Morgan | American Slavery, American Freedom | Finalist | |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Richard Pipes | Russia Under the Old Regime | Finalist | |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Frank R. Rossiter | Charles Ives and His America | Charles Ives | Finalist |
| 1976 | History and Biography | Martin J. Sherwin | A World Destroyed: Hiroshima and its Legacies | Finalist | |
| 1977 | Biography and Autobiography | W. A. Swanberg | Norman Thomas: The Last Idealist | Norman Thomas | Winner |
| 1977 | Biography and Autobiography | Peter Collier and David Horowitz | The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty | Finalist | |
| 1977 | Biography and Autobiography | Anaïs Nin | The Diary of Anaïs Nin: Volume VI 1955–1966 | Anaïs Nin | Finalist |
| 1977 | Biography and Autobiography | B. L. Reid | The Lives of Roger Casement | Roger Casement | Finalist |
| 1977 | Biography and Autobiography | E. B. White | Letters of E. B. White | E. B. White | Finalist |
| 1977 | History | Irving Howe | World of Our Fathers: The Journey of the East European Jews to America and the Life They Found and Made | Winner | |
| 1977 | History | Lawrence Goodwyn | Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America | Finalist | |
| 1977 | History | Linda Gordon | Woman's Body, Woman's Right: The History of Birth Control in America | Finalist | |
| 1977 | History | Richard Kluger | Simple Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black America's Struggle for Equality | Finalist | |
| 1977 | History | Joshua C. Taylor | America as Art | Finalist | |
| 1978 | Biography and Autobiography | W. Jackson Bate | Samuel Johnson | Samuel Johnson | Winner |
| 1978 | Biography and Autobiography | James Atlas | Delmore Schwartz: The Life of an American Poet | Finalist | |
| 1978 | Biography and Autobiography | Will D. Campbell | Brother to a Dragonfly | Finalist | |
| 1978 | Biography and Autobiography | Will Durant and Ariel Durant | A Dual Autobiography | Finalist | |
| 1978 | Biography and Autobiography | Frank Vandiver | Black Jack: The Life and Times of John J. Pershing | Finalist | |
| 1978 | History | David McCullough | The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal 1870–1914 | Winner | |
| 1978 | History | Henry Steele Commager | The Empire of Reason: How Europe Imagined and America Realized | Age of Enlightenment | Finalist |
| 1978 | History | Robert J. Donovan | Conflict and Crisis: The Presidency of Harry S. Truman, 1945–48 | Harry S. Truman | Finalist |
| 1978 | History | Joseph Kastner | A Species of Eternity | Natural history in the New World | Finalist |
| 1978 | History | Fritz Stern | Gold and Iron | Gerson Bleichröder and Otto von Bismarck | Finalist |
| 1979 | Biography and Autobiography | Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. | Robert Kennedy and His Times | Winner | |
| 1979 | Biography and Autobiography | Donald Hall | Remembering Poets | Finalist | |
| 1979 | Biography and Autobiography | William Manchester | American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur | Finalist | |
| 1979 | Biography and Autobiography | William M. Murphy | Prodigal Father: The Life of John Butler Yeats | Finalist | |
| 1979 | Biography and Autobiography | Phyllis Rose | Woman of Letters: A Life of Virginia Woolf | Virginia Woolf | Finalist |
| 1979 | History | Richard Beale Davis | Intellectual Life in the Colonial South, 1585–1763 | Winner | |
| 1979 | History | Reinhard Bendix | Kings or People: Power and the Mandate to Rule | Finalist | |
| 1979 | History | Gordon A. Craig | Germany, 1866–1945 | Finalist | |
| 1979 | History | John H. White, Jr. | The American Railroad Passenger Car | Finalist | |
| 1979 | History | Garry Wills | Inventing America: Jefferson's Declaration of Independence | Finalist |
1980s
1980–1983
From 1980 to 1983 there were dual awards for hardcover and paperback books in all nonfiction subcategories and some others. Most of the paperback award winners were second and later editions that had been previously eligible in their first editions. Here the first edition publication year is given parenthetically except the calendar year preceding the award is represented by "".In 1980, the "Nonfiction" category included the following genres, each in both paperback and hardcover.
Autobiography and Biography
Current Interest
General nonfiction
General reference
History
Religion/Inspiration
Science
1983/1984
The awards practically went out of business that spring. Their salvation with a reduced program to be determined was announced in November. The revamp was completed only next summer, with an autumn program recognizing books published during the award year. There were no awards for books published in 1983 before November.1984 entries for the "revamped" awards in merely three categories were published November 1983 to October 1984; that is, approximately during the award year. Eleven finalists were announced October 17. Winners were announced and celebrated November 15, 1984.
Repeat winners
Three books have won two literary National Book Awards, all in nonfiction subcategories of 1964 to 1983.- John Clive, Thomas Babington Macaulay: The Shaping of the Historian
- Peter Matthiessen, The Snow Leopard
- Lewis Thomas, The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher
- Justin Kaplan, 1961, 1981
- George F. Kennan, 1957, 1968
- Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 1936, 1939
- David McCullough, 1978, 1982
- Arthur Schlesinger, 1966, 1979
- Frances Steegmuller, 1971, 1981
- Lewis Thomas, 1975, 1981