The

World Fantasy Award The World Fantasy Awards are a set of awards given each year for the best fantasy fiction published during the previous calendar year. Organized and overseen by the World Fantasy Convention, the awards are given each year at the eponymous ann ...

s are given each year by the

World Fantasy Convention The World Fantasy Convention is an annual convention of professionals, collectors, and others interested in the field of fantasy. The World Fantasy Awards are presented at the event. Other features include an art show, a dealer's room, and an ...

for the best

fantasy fiction Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and dra ...

published in English during the previous calendar year. The awards have been described by book critics such as ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' as a "prestigious fantasy prize", and one of the three most prestigious speculative fiction awards, along with the

Hugo Hugo or HUGO may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Hugo'' (film), a 2011 film directed by Martin Scorsese * Hugo Award, a science fiction and fantasy award named after Hugo Gernsback * Hugo (franchise), a children's media franchise based on ...

and Nebula Awards (which cover both fantasy and

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...

). The World Fantasy Convention Award is a special award given in some years for "peerless contributions to the fantasy genre". These have included authors, editors, and publishers. Other, annually-presented special awards are given out for professional or non-professional work in the prior year in the Special Award—Professional and Special Award—Non-professional categories. A Life Achievement award is also given annually. The World Fantasy Convention Award was first presented in 1978; it was awarded annually through 1987 and again in 1997 and 2013. It has not been awarded since, though it is still listed as an official category. Most World Fantasy Award nominees and winners are decided by attendees and judges of the annual World Fantasy Convention. A ballot is posted in June for attendees of the current and previous two conferences to determine two of the finalists, and a panel of five judges adds three or more nominees before voting on the overall winner. The panel of judges is typically made up of fantasy authors and is chosen each year by the World Fantasy Awards Administration, which has the power to break ties. Unlike the other World Fantasy Award categories, the Convention Award has no nominees and is not decided in the usual way; instead, the winner is selected by the convention organizers themselves and announced along with the nominees in the other categories. The final results are presented at the World Fantasy Convention at the end of October. Through 2015, winners were presented with a statuette of H. P. Lovecraft; more recent winners receive a statuette of a tree. Thirteen people and one publishing house have been given the Convention Award. Seven of the winners are primarily known for their writing, as opposed to editing work or artwork. Six of the winners have gone on to be awarded the Lifetime Achievement award, sometimes only a few years after they were given a Convention Award:

Evangeline Walton Evangeline Walton (24 November 1907 – 11 March 1996) was the pen name of Evangeline Wilna Ensley, an American writer of fantasy fiction. She remains popular in North America and Europe because of her “ability to humanize historical and mytho ...

four years later in 1989,

Andre Norton Andre Alice Norton (born Alice Mary Norton, February 17, 1912 – March 17, 2005) was an American writer of science fiction and fantasy, who also wrote works of historical and contemporary fiction. She wrote primarily under the pen name ...

eleven years later in 1998, Hugh B. Cave two years later in 1999,

Donald M. Grant Donald Metcalf Grant (April 3, 1927 – August 19, 2009) was an American publisher. Biography He was born in Providence, Rhode Island in 1927 and graduated from the University of Rhode Island in 1949. Grant's interest in fantasy and science ...

nineteen years later in 2003, and Stephen King and

Gahan Wilson Gahan Allen Wilson (February 18, 1930 – November 21, 2019) was an American author, cartoonist and illustrator known for his cartoons depicting horror-fantasy situations. Biography Wilson was born in Evanston, Illinois, and was inspired by th ...

, twenty-four and twenty-three years later in 2004.

Winners

In the following table, the years correspond to the date of the ceremony. Items in the Work(s) column are items and companies that the winner created or worked at; they are meant to be representative of the winner's career in the field of fantasy to that point, but the World Fantasy Convention Award is not given for any specific achievement, and no such achievements are listed by the World Fantasy Convention as reasons for the award. In some cases the winner is well known for their non-fantasy works, such as science fiction novels, which are not listed.

References

External links

World Fantasy Convention official site

{{featured list Convention Award