Living Canon

Arthur C. Clarke Award 2017: Complete list of winners

The 2017 Arthur C. Clarke Award season brought fascinating conversations about what science fiction can be and do. The prestigious Arthur C. Clarke Award, which honors the most imaginative science fiction novels published in the United Kingdom, recognized work that pushed beyond traditional genre boundaries. This year’s selection reflected a growing trend in speculative fiction: the recognition that the most powerful science fiction stories are often those that use fantastical premises to examine urgent contemporary realities.

Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad emerged as a standout in the Arthur C. Clarke Award conversation, demonstrating how the genre continues to evolve. By reimagining the historical Underground Railroad as an actual railroad—a vast network of tracks and stations beneath the earth—Whitehead created a work of extraordinary imagination that deepens our understanding of slavery, resistance, and freedom. The novel exemplifies what makes the Clarke Award important: its commitment to recognizing science fiction that transcends escapism to illuminate fundamental truths about the human experience. The award itself, named after the visionary author Arthur C. Clarke, has long championed this kind of intellectually ambitious and socially conscious speculative fiction.

The 2017 Arthur C. Clarke Award winners and shortlist selections showcase the breadth of contemporary science fiction:

Science Fiction