Somerset Maugham Award

The Somerset Maugham Award is a British literary prize given each year by the Society of Authors. Set up by William Somerset Maugham in 1947 the awards enable young writers to enrich their work by gaining experience in foreign countries. The awards go to writers under the age of 35^[1] with works published in the year before the award; the work can be either non-fiction, fiction or poetry.^[2]

Since 1964 multiple winners have usually been chosen in the same year. In 1975 and in 2012 the award was not given.^[3]

List of winners

1940s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1947–1949^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher
1947	A. L. Barker	Innocents	Hogarth Press
1948	P. H. Newby	Journey to the Interior	Jonathan Cape
1949	Hamish Henderson	Elegies for the Dead in Cyrenaica	John Lehmann

1950s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1950–1959^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
1950	Nigel Kneale	Tomato Cain & Other Stories	Collins
1951	Roland Camberton	Scamp	John Lehmann
1952	Francis King	The Dividing Stream	Longman
1953	Emyr Humphreys	Hear and Forgive	Gollancz
1954	Doris Lessing	Five Short Novels	Michael Joseph
1955	Kingsley Amis	Lucky Jim	Gollancz
1956	Elizabeth Jennings	A Way of Looking	Deutsch
1957	George Lamming	In the Castle of My Skin	Michael Joseph	[5][6]
1958	John Wain	Preliminary Essays	Macmillan
1959	Thom Gunn	A Sense of Movement	Faber and Faber

1960s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1960–1969^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
1960	Ted Hughes	The Hawk in the Rain	Faber and Faber
1961	V. S. Naipaul	Miguel Street	Deutsch
1962	Hugh Thomas	The Spanish Civil War	Eyre & Spottiswoode
1963	David Storey	Flight Into Camden	Longman
1964	Dan Jacobson	Time of Arrival	Weidenfeld
	John Le Carré	The Spy Who Came in from the Cold	Gollancz
1965	Peter Everett	Negatives	Jonathan Cape
1966	Michael Frayn	The Tin Men	Collins
1966	Julian Mitchell	The White Father	Constable
1967	B.S. Johnson	Trawl	Secker & Warburg
	Andrew Sinclair	The Better Half	Jonathan Cape
1968	Paul Bailey	At The Jerusalem	Jonathan Cape	[7][8]
	Seamus Heaney	Death of a Naturalist	Faber and Faber
1969	Angela Carter	Several Perceptions	Heinemann

1970s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1970–1979^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
1970	Jane Gaskell	A Sweet Sweet Summer	Hodder & Stoughton
	Piers Paul Read	Monk Dawson	Secker & Warburg
1971	Richard Barber	The Knight and Chivalry	Longman
	Michael Hastings	Tussy Is Me	Weidenfeld
	Susan Hill	I’m the King of the Castle	Hamish Hamilton
1972	Douglas Dunn	Terry Street	Faber and Faber
	Gillian Tindall	Fly Away Home	Hodder & Stoughton
1973	Peter Prince	Play Things	Gollancz	[9]
	Paul Strathern	A Season in Abyssinia	Macmillan
	Jonathan Street	Prudence Dictates	Hart-Davis
1974	Martin Amis	The Rachel Papers	Jonathan Cape	[10][11]
1975	No Award			[12]
1976	Dominic Cooper	The Dead of Winter	Chatto & Windus
	Ian McEwan	First Love, Last Rites	Jonathan Cape	[13]
1977	Richard Holmes	Shelley: The Pursuit	Quartet Books
1978	Tom Paulin	A State of Justice	Faber and Faber
	Nigel Williams	My Life Closed Twice	Secker & Warburg
1979	Helen Hodgman	Jack & Jill	Duckworth	[14][12]
	Sara Maitland	Daughter of Jerusalem	Blond & Briggs

1980s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1980–1989^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
1980	Humphrey Carpenter	The Inklings	Allen & Unwin
	Max Hastings	Bomber Command	Michael Joseph	[15]
	Christopher Reid	Arcadia	Oxford University Press
1981	Julian Barnes	Metroland	Jonathan Cape
	Clive Sinclair	Hearts of Gold	Allison & Busby	[16][17]
	A. N. Wilson	The Healing Art	Secker & Warburg
1982	William Boyd	A Good Man in Africa	Hamish Hamilton
	Adam Mars-Jones	Lantern Lecture	Faber and Faber
1983	Lisa St Aubin de Teran	Keepers of the House	Jonathan Cape
1984	Peter Ackroyd	The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde	Hamish Hamilton
	Timothy Garton Ash	The Polish Revolution: Solidarity	Jonathan Cape
	Sean O'Brien	The Indoor Park	Bloodaxe Books	[18]
1985	Blake Morrison	Dark Glasses	Chatto & Windus	[19]
	Jeremy Reed	By the Fisheries	Jonathan Cape
	Jane Rogers	Her Living Image	Faber and Faber	[20][21][22]
1986	Patricia Ferguson	Family Myths and Legends	Andre Deutsch	[23]
	Adam Nicolson	Frontiers	Weidenfeld & Nicolson
	Tim Parks	Tongues of Flame	Heinemann
1987	Stephen Gregory	The Cormorant	Heinemann	[24]
	Janni Howker	Isaac Campion	Julia MacRae
	Andrew Motion	The Lamberts	Chatto & Windus
1988	Jimmy Burns	The Land That Lost Its Heroes	Bloomsbury
	Carol Ann Duffy	Selling Manhattan	Anvil
	Matthew Kneale	Whore Banquets	Gollancz Heinemann
1989	Rupert Christiansen	Romantic Affinities	Bodley Head
	Alan Hollinghurst	The Swimming-Pool Library	Chatto & Windus
	Deirdre Madden	The Birds of the Innocent Wood	Faber and Faber

1990s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 1990–1999^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
1990	Mark Hudson	Our Grandmothers' Drums	Secker & Warburg
	Sam North	The Automatic Man	Secker & Warburg	[25]
	Nicholas Shakespeare	The Vision of Elena Silves	Collins Harvill
1991	Peter Benson	The Other Occupant	Macmillan	[26]
	Lesley Glaister	Honour Thy Father	Secker & Warburg	[27][28]
	Helen Simpson	Four Bare Legs in a Bed	Heinemann
1992	Geoff Dyer	But Beautiful	Jonathan Cape	[29][30]
	Lawrence Norfolk	Lempriere’s Dictionary	S. Stevenson
	Gerard Woodward	Householder	Chatto & Windus
1993	Dea Birkett	Jella	Gollancz
	Glyn Maxwell	Out of the Rain	Bloodaxe Books	[31]
	Duncan McLean	Bucket of Tongues	Secker & Warburg	[32][33]
1994	Jackie Kay	Other Lovers	Bloodaxe Books
	A. L. Kennedy	Looking for the Possible Dance	Secker & Warburg
	Philip Marsden	Crossing Place	HarperCollins
1995	Patrick French	Younghusband	HarperCollins	[34]
	Simon Garfield	The End of Innocence	Faber and Faber
	Kathleen Jamie	The Queen of Sheba	Bloodaxe Books	[35]
	Laura Thompson	The Dogs	Chatto & Windus	[36]
1996	Katherine Pierpoint	Truffle Beds	Faber and Faber	[37]
	Alan Warner	Morvern Callar	Vintage	[38]
1997	Rhidian Brook	The Testimony of Taliesin Jones	Flamingo
	Kate Clanchy	Slattern	Chatto & Windus	[39]
	Philip Hensher	Kitchen Venom	Hamish Hamilton
	Francis Spufford	I May Be Some Time	Faber and Faber
1998	Rachel Cusk	The Country Life	Picador, Macmillan	[40]
	Jonathan Rendall	This Bloody Mary is the Last Thing I Own	Faber and Faber
	Kate Summerscale	The Queen of Whale Cay	Fourth Estate
	Robert Twigger	Angry White Pyjamas	Indigo
1999	Andrea Ashworth	Once In a House On Fire	Picador, Macmillan
	Paul Farley	The Boy from the Chemist Is Here To See You	Picador, Macmillan
	Giles Foden	The Last King of Scotland	Faber and Faber
	Jonathan Freedland	Bring Home the Revolution	Fourth Estate

2000s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 2000–2009^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
2000	Bella Bathurst	The Lighthouse Stevensons	HarperCollins	[41]
	Sarah Waters	Affinity	Virago Press	[42]
2001	Edward Platt	Leadville	Picador, Macmillan
	Ben Rice	Pobby and Dingan	Jonathan Cape	[12]
2002	Charlotte Hobson	Black Earth City	Granta
	Marcel Theroux	The Paperchase	Abacus
2003	William Fiennes	The Snow Geese	Picador, Macmillan
	Hari Kunzru	The Impressionist	Hamish Hamilton	[43]
	Jon McGregor	If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things	Bloomsbury	[44][45]
2004	Mark Blayney	Two Kinds of Silence	Manuscript Publishing	[46]
	Robert Macfarlane	Mountains of the Mind	Granta
	Charlotte Mendelson	Daughters of Jerusalem	Picador, Macmillan	[47][48][49]
2005	Justin Hill	Passing Under Heaven	Abacus
	Maggie O'Farrell	The Distance Between Us	Review	[50][51]
2006	Chris Cleave	Incendiary	Chatto & Windus
	Owen Sheers	Skirrid Hill	Seren Books
	Zadie Smith	On Beauty	Hamish Hamilton
2007	Horatio Clare	Running for the Hills	John Murray	[52]
	James Scudamore	The Amnesia Clinic	Harvill Secker	[53][54]
2008	Steven Hall	The Raw Shark Texts	Canongate Books	[55]
	Nick Laird	On Purpose	Faber and Faber	[56]
	Gwendoline Riley	Joshua Spassky	Cape	[57]
	Adam Thirlwell	Miss Herbert (US title: The Delighted States)	Cape	[58][59]
2009	Alice Albinia	Empires of the Indus: The Story of a River	John Murray
	Adam Foulds	The Broken Word	Cape
	Rodge Glass	Alasdair Gray: A Secretary’s Biography	Bloomsbury	[60]
	Henry Hitchings	The Secret Life of Words: How English Became English	John Murray
	Thomas Leveritt	The Exchange Rate Between Love and Money	Harvill Secker
	Helen Walsh	Once Upon a Time in England	Canongate Books	[61]

2010s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 2010–2019^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Prize	Ref.
2010	Ben Wilson	What Price Liberty?	Faber and Faber	£2,000	[62]
	Helen Oyeyemi	White is for Witching	Picador	£3,000	[63][64]
	Jacob Polley	Talk of the Town	Picador	£5,000	[65]
2011	Miriam Gamble	The Squirrels Are Dead	Bloodaxe	£3,500
	Alexandra Harris	Romantic Moderns	Thames and Hudson	£3,500
	Adam O'Riordan	In the Flesh	Chatto Poetry	£3,500	[66]
2012	No award given				[12]
2013	Ned Beauman	The Teleportation Accident	Sceptre	£2,500	[67]
	Abi Curtis	The Glass Delusion	Salt	£2,500
	Joe Stretch	The Adult	Cape	£2,500
	Lucy Wood	Diving Belles	Bloomsbury	£2,500
2014	Amy Sackville	Orkney	Granta	£2,000
	Daisy Hildyard	Hunters in the Snow Glass Delusion	Cape	£4,000
	Nadifa Mohamed	The Orchard of Lost Souls	Simon & Schuster	£4,000	[68]
2015	Jonathan Beckman	How to Ruin a Queen: Marie Antoinette, the Stolen Diamonds and the Scandal that Shook the French Throne	John Murray	£2,500	[69]
	Liz Berry	Black Country	Chatto & Windus	£2,500	[69]
	Ben Brooks	Lolito	Canongate Books	£2,500	[69]
	Zoe Pilger	Eat My Heart Out	Serpent’s Tail	£2,500	[69]
2016	Jessie Greengrass	An Account Of The Decline Of The Great Auk, According To One Who Saw It	JM Originals	£2,500
	Daisy Hay	Mr & Mrs Disraeli: A Strange Romance	Chatto & Windus	£2,500
	Andrew McMillan	Physical	Cape Poetry	£2,500	[70][71][72]
	Thomas Morris	We Don’t Know What We’re Doing	Faber and Faber	£2,500
	Jack Underwood	Happiness	Faber and Faber	£2,500
2017	Edmund Gordon	The Invention of Angela Carter	Vintage	£5,000	[73]
	Melissa Lee-Houghton	Sunshine	Penned in the Margins	£5,000	[73]
	Martin MacInnes	Infinite Ground	Atlantic Books	£5,000
2018	Kayo Chingonyi	Kumukanda	Chatto Poetry	£5,250	[74]
	Fiona Mozley	Elmet	JM Originals	£5,250
	Miriam Nash	All the Prayers in the House	Bloodaxe	£5,250
2019	Raymond Antrobus	The Perseverance	Penned in the Margins	£4,000	[75][76]
	Damian Le Bas	The Stopping Places	Chatto & Windus	£4,000
	Phoebe Power	Shrines of Upper Austria	Carcanet	£4,000
	Nell Stevens	Mrs Gaskell and Me	Picador	£4,000

2020s

Somerset Maugham Award winners, 2020–present^[4]

Year	Author	Title	Publisher	Ref.
2020	Oliver Soden	Michael Tippett: The Biography	Weidenfeld & Nicolson/Orion
	Roseanne Watt	Moder Dy	Birlinn/Polygon
	Alex Allison	The Art of the Body	Dialogue Books/Little, Brown & Co.
	Amrou Al-Kadhi	Unicorn	4th Estate
2021	Lamorna Ash	Dark, Salt, Clear	Bloomsbury
	Isabelle Baafi	Ripe	Ignition Press
	Akeem Balogun	The Storm	Okapi Books
	Graeme Armstrong	The Young Team	Pan Macmillan/Picador	[77]
2022	Stephanie Sy-Quia	Amnion	Granta, Granta Poetry	[78]
	Tice Cin	Keeping the House	And Other Stories	[78][79]
	Lucia Osborne-Crowley	My Body Keeps Your Secrets	Indigo Press	[78]
	Caleb Azumah Nelson	Open Water	Penguin Random House/Viking Press	[78]
	Maia Elsner	Overrun by Wild Boars	Flipped Eye Publishing	[78]
2023	Travis Alabanza	None of the Above	Canongate	[80]
	Sussie Anie	To Fill a Yellow House	Phoenix Books	[80]
	Mya-Rose Craig	Birdgirl	Penguin	[80]
	Jay Gao	Imperium	Carcanet	[80]
	Gurnaik Johal	We Move	Profile	[80]
	Moses McKenzie	An Olive Grove in Ends	Wildfire	[80]
2024	Iona Lee	Anamesis		[81]
	Momtaza Mehri	Bad Diaspora Poems		[81]
	Katherine Pangonis	Twilight Cities		[81]
	Cecile Pin	Wandering Souls		[81]
	Phoenicia Rogerson	Herc	HarperCollins/HQ Stories	[81]