Percival Everett's Pulitzer Prize Win In Context

Last March while reading Percival Everett's James and tracking the coverage of the novel, I, along with many others, predicted that the novel would win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The prediction came to fruition yesterday when it was announced that James had received the prize. 

This is not the only major honor James has garnered. In 2024, Everett won both the Kirkus Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction. The novel was a finalist for the Booker Prize. In March, the audiobook version of James, read by Dominic Hoffman, received an Audie Award in the Literary Fiction/Classics category. 

This marks the third time an African American novel has won both the National Book Award for Fiction and Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The first was Alice Walker's The Color Purple (1982), followed by Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad (2016), and now Everett's James. 

Notably, this James is also fourth Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by a Black writer to take the form of a neo-slave narrative. The others Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987), Edward P. Jones's The Known World (2003),  and Whitehead's The Underground Railroad (2016). Put another way, four of the seven African American books to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction are neo-slave narratives. 

To date, six African American writers have received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: James Alan McPherson (1978), Alice Walker (1983), Toni Morrison (1988), Edward P. Jones (2004), Colson Whitehead (2017 and 2020), and Everett (2025).