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The program, which marks its 25th anniversary this year, has awarded more than $6 million to 250 poets, fiction and nonfiction writers, and playwrights. Among the past recipients who have gone on to achieve acclaim and prominence in their field are Denis Johnson, Mona Simpson, Tony Kushner, Jorie Graham, Gretel Ehrlich, Michael Cunningham, Alice McDermott, William T. Vollman, Ian Frazier, David Foster Wallace, Suzan-Lori Parks, Mark Doty, Jeffrey Eugenides, C.D.Wright, and Colson Whitehead. This year’s winners include several who have just published or will soon publish a first book. Although some were born in such far-flung places as Vietnam, South Korea, Puerto Rico, and The United Kingdom, they are now all living and working in this country, from California to Florida, to Nevada, to Alaska, and New York. “This group of writers brings delightful surprises and pleasures,” says Barbara Bristol, the Director of the Writers’ Program. “Two transcendent non-fiction writers, one preoccupied with the fascinations of the insect world, and the other with the vibrant life of an ancient Beijing neighborhood; four fearless, dazzling writers of novels and short fiction; three fresh poetic voices; and a provocative, risk-taking playwright. We warmly welcome them into our now distinguished 25-year roster of Whiting Award recipients and look forward to these writers enriching American letters for many years to come.” The 2009 recipients were announced at a ceremony at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York on Wednesday, October 28. Dr. Robert L. Belknap, President of the Foundation, and trustee Kate Douglas Torrey presented the ten writers with their awards. The keynote speaker of the evening was the brilliant, visionary writer Margaret Atwood, whose new novel, The Year of the Flood, was just published to wide critical acclaim. Ms. Atwood is the author of more than forty books of fiction, poetry, children’s books and critical essays. Her novels include The Handmaid’s Tale; Cat’s Eye, shortlisted for the Booker Prize; Alias Grace, which won the Giller Prize in Canada; The Blind Assassin, winner of the 2000 Booker Prize; and Oryx and Crake, shortlisted for the 2003 Booker Prize. Long considered one of Canada’s pre-eminent writers, she lives in Toronto. The ten writers recognized this year for their extraordinary talent and promise are: Jericho Brown, poetry. Please is his first book, published by New Issues Poetry & Prose in 2008. He lives in San Diego. Jay Hopler, poetry. His first collection, Green Squall, was published by Yale University Press in 2005. He lives in Tampa, Florida. Adam Johnson, fiction. He is the author of Emporium (Viking 2002) and Parasites Like Us (Viking, 2003). He lives in San Francisco. Rajiv Joseph, plays. His productions include Animals out of Paper, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo and the forthcoming Gruesome Playground Injuries. He lives in Brooklyn. Joan Kane, poetry. The Cormorant Hunter’s Wife, her first collection, will be published by NorthShore Press this fall. She lives in Anchorage. Michael Meyer, nonfiction. The Last Days of Old Beijing: Life in the Vanishing Backstreets of a City Transformed, was published by Walker & Company in 2008. Soon to return to China, he lives in New York City. Nami Mun, fiction. Miles from Nowhere, a novel, was published by Riverhead in 2009. Born in Seoul, South Korea, she lives in Chicago. Hugh Raffles, nonfiction. He is the author of In Amazonia: A Natural History (Princeton University Press, 2002), and The Illustrated Insectopedia, which Pantheon will publish in the spring of 2010. A Professor of Anthropology at The New School, he lives in New York City. Salvatore Scibona, fiction. The End, his first novel, was published by Graywolf Press in 2008 and shortlisted for the National Book Awards. He lives in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Vu Tran, fiction. This accomplished short story writer has an as-yet-untitled first novel forthcoming from W.W. Norton. Born in Viet Nam, he now lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. For more detailed biographies of the 2009 winners, click here. Whiting Writers’ Awards candidates are proposed by about a hundred anonymous nominators from across the country whose experience and vocations give them knowledge about individuals of extraordinary talent. Winners are chosen by a small anonymous selection committee of recognized writers, literary scholars, and editors, appointed annually by the Foundation. At four meetings over the course of the year, the selectors discuss the candidates’ work and gradually winnow the list. They then recommend up to ten writers for awards to the Foundation’s Trustees. The Foundation accepts nominations only from the designated nominators. The Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation was established in 1963 by Flora E. Whiting. In 1972, her unrestricted bequest of over $10 million enabled the Foundation to establish the Whiting Fellowships in the Humanities for doctoral candidates in their dissertation year. In the years since, the Foundation has annually awarded grants to Bryn Mawr, University of Chicago, Columbia, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, and Yale to fund these Fellowships, the recipients of which are selected by each institution. The Foundation created the Whiting Writers’ Awards in 1985 under the direction of Gerald Freund, who organized and led the program until his death in 1997. For more information about the selection process, click here. 
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