A new prestigious literary accolade is making waves in the United States, marking its debut with a generous prize and a distinguished recipient. The University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop has announced Tony Tulathimutte as the first winner of the Jack Galef Literary Arts Award.
Celebrating Literary Excellence
The award ceremony is set to take place at Hancher Auditorium’s Stanley Café on September 29, at 4 p.m., celebrating this inaugural event. This prize, one of the largest in the literary domain with a sum of $150,000, is funded by the estate of Jack Galef, a notable alumnus of the workshop.
Tulathimutte, a 2012 MFA graduate from Iowa and a visiting faculty member at the workshop, has been recognized for his impactful work in literature. His debut novel, Private Citizens, was lauded by New York Magazine as “the first great millennial novel.” The book intricately portrays the lives of four Stanford graduates navigating the complex landscape of the San Francisco Bay Area during the Great Recession.
Acknowledging Emerging Talent
Additionally, Tulathimutte’s upcoming 2024 short story collection, Rejection, has already garnered attention, being longlisted for the National Book Award. Carmen Maria Machado praises it as “unrelentingly brutal and gut-bustingly funny.”
Reflecting on the honor, Tulathimutte expressed his gratitude, stating, “I feel enormously lucky and grateful to be the inaugural recipient of the Jack Galef Award. I hope I can prove that supporting writers is worthwhile.” He also noted the challenges faced by writers, emphasizing, “One of the things everybody knows but almost everybody underrates is just how much of an impediment to writing the struggle for a livelihood is.”
Award Vision and Legacy
The Jack Galef Literary Arts Award, presented biennially, aims to support younger writers with exceptional potential or to recognize underappreciated established writers. A committee of workshop faculty members is responsible for selecting the recipients.
Lan Samantha Chang, director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, highlighted the significance of the prize by saying, “It is a privilege for the Iowa Writers’ Workshop to present the Jack Galef Literary Arts Award. We are delighted to award the inaugural prize to an iconic writer of pathbreaking fiction.”
Jack L. Galef II, a 1967 graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, left a substantial legacy in the literary world with his teaching at the School of Visual Arts in New York and his poetry published in esteemed outlets like The New Yorker, Esquire, and The Paris Review.
Jane Van Voorhis, assistant vice president at the UI Center for Advancement, elaborated on Galef’s vision for the award: “With this prize, Mr. Galef intended to elevate younger writers with great potential who have done very good work but have not yet been noticed, or to shine a light on writers who are perhaps more mature but whose genius has not been adequately recognized.”
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