Ta-Nehisi Coates to receive prize for literary excellence in Montgomery

The Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum in Montgomery has chosen author and journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates to receive its 2023 Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence.

The museum awards the Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence annually to an author whose work continues the legacy of American storytelling “while also exemplifying the craft, wit, and social insight typified by F. Scott Fitzgerald.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald was a playwright, novelist, poet, veteran, and author of short stories. The Fitzgerald Prize recognizes a writer’s contribution in one or more of these areas.

“The Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum are pleased to award Ta-Nehisi Coates the 2023 Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence for his work in promoting social and racial understanding as an essayist and novelist, while also fostering American storytelling as an educator and writer across multiple disciplines and genres including screenwriter and graphic novelist,” the museum wrote in an announcement.

Coates will be the eighth recipient of the Fitzgerald Prize.

Daron K. Harris, the Fitzgerald Museum vice president and public relations spokesperson, says the prize winners are selected from nominations by a committee of museum board members.

Coates was a national correspondent for The Atlantic where he wrote about the intersection of race, culture, economics, and politics. Coates is also the author of a number of books, including “The Beautiful Struggle,” and “We Were Eight Years in Power.” His book, “Between The World And Me,” won the National Book Award in 2015. His first novel, “The Water Dancer,” was released in September 2019. Coates was also named a MacArthur Genius that year. Coates also penned Marvel’s “Black Panther” series from 2016 to 2021 and “Captain America” from 2018 to 2021.

“We are pleased to award an author whose works span as widely as Fitzgerald’s did; Essayist, Novelist, and Screenwriter,” Dr. Alaina Doten, the executive director of the museum, said in a press release about the award. “The goal of the prize is to award authors who will help inspire the next generation of American writers, and we believe that Coates has and will continue to inspire young writers to express themselves across a wide spectrum of genres and topics as well.”

Coates will accept the award during a ceremony and lecture in September.

Troy University’s Davis Theatre in Montgomery will host “An Evening with Ta-Nehisi Coates” on Friday, Sept. 22 from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. The evening will include a discussion between Coates and Dr. Derryn Moten, professor and chair of history at Alabama State University. Tickets for the award ceremony and lecture are $28 and available on Eventbrite. Organizers encourage potential audience members to submit questions for the discussion in advance using a submission link.

[Click here for the Q& A submission link]

Coates will speak to the students of Alabama State University earlier in the day.

“Ta-Nehisi Coates’ ‘Between the World and Me’ attempts to explain racism in the United States to his teenage son which is an attempt to explain pseudo American Exceptionalism,” Moten said in the same release. " One is reminded of James Baldwin’s ‘Letter to my Nephew’ where Baldwin attempts to explain the same realities. Alabama State University is delighted to have Coates speak on campus on September 22nd, 2023.”

Previous recipients of the Fitzgerald Prize have been the retired Navy SEAL and author Clint Emerson (2022); Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and Southern writer Rick Bragg (2021); social and legal reformer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, Bryan Stevenson (2020); and Alabama authors Frye Gaillard (2019), Wayne Flynt (2018), Katherine Clark (2017) and Kim Cross (2016).