Mythopoeic Award

The Mythopoeic Awards for literature and literary studies are given by the Mythopoeic Society to authors of outstanding works in the fields of myth, fantasy, and the scholarly study of these areas.

From 1971 to 1991 there were two awards, annual but not always awarded before 1981, recognizing Mythopoeic Fantasy and Mythopoeic Scholarship (Inklings Studies). Dual awards in each category were established in 1992: Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards for Adult Literature and Children's Literature; Scholarship Awards in Inklings Studies and Myth and Fantasy Studies. In 2010 a Student Paper Award was introduced for the best paper presented at Mythcon by an undergraduate or graduate student; it was renamed the Alexei Kondratiev Award several months after its creation.

The 2016 finalists were announced at the beginning of June and the awards were announced August 7, 2016, at the annual conference.

The Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards recognize single-author fantasy that "best exemplifies “the spirit of the Inklings”". Dual awards for Adult and Children's Literature replaced a single award in 1992 and they have been combined once since then (1997). The Mythopoeic Society publishes a record of all finalists; from 1992 there are three to five books on each final ballot.

An eligible book is a "novel, multi-volume novel, or single-author story collection" published during the preceding three years, although it may appear on the final ballot only once — a multi-volume novel when its last volume is published.

Several authors have won at least two Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards (below).

Children's Literature is "books for younger readers (from “Young Adults” to picture books for beginning readers), in the tradition of The Hobbit or The Chronicles of Narnia." Books are allocated to one of the two categories by consensus.

There are dual Mythopoeic Scholarship Awards since 1992 (and a Student Paper Award, not covered here, since 2010). The Scholarship Award in Inklings Studies dates from 1971, in effect, if its name was expanded in 1992.

Scholarly works have three years to win the award once and may be on the final ballot three times.

Several authors have won at least two Mythopoeic Fantasy Awards.

McKillip has been a finalist for one of the fantasy awards with 14 different books. Robin McKinley (once a winner) and Yolen have been finalists seven times; Gaiman and Jones six times, Powers five times.

Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull won the Inklings Studies award for four different collaborations from 1996 to 2007, as did Hammond and Douglas A. Anderson once previously.

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