Winning
awards is nice. Getting a certificate in the mail can be satisfying. Hanging a
plaque on the wall is gratifying. Standing up in a crowded banquet hall to give
an acceptance speech can be downright uplifting.
But does it
matter?
Most
everyone in the book business thinks so. We fill out entry forms and enter
awards competitions and hope the judges recognize the brilliance of our work. We
herald our accomplishments in press releases and author bios and on book
covers.
Trouble is,
there are too many awards.
You’re hard
pressed nowadays to find a writer who’s not billed as an “award-winning
author.” As a result, awards are good for the ego, but you have to wonder if they’re
good for much else.
I have been
honored by winning the Western Writers of America Spur Award. Everyone who’s
anyone in the world of Western literature will tell you Spur Awards—along with
the Wrangler Award from the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum—are as
good as it gets; the most prestigious recognition there is.
But beyond
those in the know, it would be difficult to find a reader who knows the
difference between a hard-to-get award like a Spur or a Wrangler and the kind
they pass out by the pallet load for doing little more than getting your name
on a book cover—including books you publish yourself.
Given this
state of affairs, is there any value to winning an award?
I don’t know. I’ll think about it.
I don’t know. I’ll think about it.
But for now,
you’ll have to excuse me—I’ve got to fill out the entry forms for another award
competition.
Good one Rod. It's not only the proliferation of awards that tends to cheapen the results, the process of judging is inherently subjective. Like beauty, appreciation is in the eye of the beholder. The winner isn't always determined by what's between the covers. I discovered this a few years ago when a book I'd read came out a contest winner. I'd read a couple of other books in the contest too. I found myself wondering how that particular title won. The answer was on the cover. The sentimental favorite won. I've been fortunate enough to have a couple of winners too. I've learned to put them away with a grain of salt.
ReplyDeleteRight you are, Paul. Sometimes it's hard to explain why winners win. But, most of the time, I can see why those foolish judges thought another book or poem or story was better than mine--because I thought so, too.
DeleteI, for one, would be honored to win a Spur or Willa award for my writing. Maybe it is my lack of self confidence that boosts that desire. I like the idea of my writing being validated by someone I respect. AND, for me...it would be fun, and exciting!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Janice. I would be honored to win any award, despite their imperfections. Most writers I know will always welcome the recognition.
DeleteYou are so right, Rod. Everybody is either an award-winner or brag on being a nominee. I have won multiple awards for poetry books, CDs and poet-of-the-year and have yet to sell any product or get hired to perform because someone saw that I won an award. The real award is getting good response from someone who purchases your work or hires you to perform and then hires you again. The best "reward" is the wonderful people you meet because of your work, like yourself, Rod.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Yvonne. Awards are good for the ego, and perhaps some measure of validation from your peers, but beyond that it is hard to say. Having an effect on readers is, as you say, what really matters.
DeleteI suspect I'd feel different if, after 40 years of toiling in the fiction field, I'd ever won an award for anything (and why are awards so often awarded to members of the outfit offering the award? I'm not a joiner, so there you are,), but that said, the only material value of an award is commercial. Hey, it's an Edgar winner! A good leverage point in negotiating contracts. Good publicity. I see that. And if winning means happiness for the winner, who am I to steal that? But the absurdity of the award concept is that it reduces and thus cheapen art to a competitive sport.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment, Stephen. I am most familiar with the Western Writers of America Spur Awards, and I’m pretty sure the reason many Spur Awards are won by WWA members is because most of the best Western writers are members of WWA. However, many, many Spur winners are not WWA members—but lots of them join after winning because they see what an outstanding organization it is. I cannot speak to other groups and their awards.
DeleteJudging awards shows—and I know this from experience—is wildly subjective. And while I may not always agree with the results, even in categories I have judged, I don't think I've seen a bad book win.
Finally, the fact that everything about a literary competition is out of the hands of the entrants, that changes the competitive nature of it all. Unlike sports (at least most of them), a writer can do nothing to affect the outcome; there’s no offense, no defense, no way to help yourself or hinder your opponent. So, I think the “competition” in any contest is, by nature, very different.
At this point, I’ve gone on so long I should have saved this response and turned it into a post of its own. Thanks again, Stephen.
Thank you for responding, and I appreciate that in human terms the WWA, and surely most other professional writer organizations for that matter, are comprised of good, decent, intelligent, hardworking folks. But as for the process being out of the hands of the entrants...please! I've known too many relentless campaigners for such awards over the years to agree. I guess they call it networking. Heck, I know one bunch who formed such a group (friends, so they'll go unnamed) who put together the organization pretty much for the sole purpose of giving each other awards! (Of course, they say they're promoting their genre.) But hey, I'm honestly not hard-lining it here. Congrats to all those who have won awards. I simply remain unconvinced that awards have much if anything to do with the actual craft of writing.
ReplyDelete