Letter from a Reader 5.7.26
Were the fiction Pulitzer results unintentionally rigged? Plus: classic novels that lost and a New Yorker story that mocks the writing of a winner who sounds like Cormac McCarthy
You may notice something curious if you pore over the reviews of the fiction Pulitzer winner and finalists, as I’ve been doing since Monday. Critics have described all three books in terms like “genre-bending” or “genre-blending.”
Is this just another sign that reviewers need to kill the clichés? Or does it suggest that the Pulitzer organization wanted to stack the deck in favor of a certain kind of winner?
Here’s my response as a critic who’s known at least a dozen past jurors and served as the vice president for awards of another major U.S. prize-giver.