Pulitzer Prizes 1925: Complete list of winners

The 1925 Pulitzer Prizes marked a particularly vibrant moment in American letters, celebrating work that ranged from sweeping historical narratives to intimate character studies. Edna Ferber’s So Big, a novel about a widow’s determination to build a meaningful life on the Illinois prairie, claimed the fiction prize that year, establishing Ferber as one of the era’s most significant voices. The Pulitzer Prize Drama award went to Sidney Howard’s They Knew What They Wanted, a play that brought working-class characters and genuine human complexity to the American stage—a sign that serious drama was moving beyond drawing room comedies and melodrama. Meanwhile, Edwin Arlington Robinson’s The Man Who Died Twice secured the poetry prize, continuing Robinson’s remarkable run as one of America’s most decorated poets.

What’s striking about this particular year is how the Pulitzer Prizes reflected the literary ferment of the 1920s, a decade when American writers were interrogating identity, class, and regional experience with newfound urgency. Frederic L. Paxson’s History of the American Frontier and M. A. Dewolfe Howe’s Barrett Wendell and His Letters rounded out the awards, offering readers windows into how Americans were making sense of their own past and intellectual traditions. These five works, taken together, suggest a moment when the Pulitzer Prizes were embracing both innovation and tradition, honoring writers who were reshaping American literature while also celebrating those who documented the nation’s evolving self-understanding.

Below you’ll find details on each winner and their achievements that year.

Biography

• Barrett Wendell and His Letters by M. A. Dewolfe Howe

Drama

• They Knew What They Wanted by Sidney Howard

History

• History of the American Frontier by Frederic L. Paxson

Novel

• So Big by Edna Ferber

Poetry

• The Man Who Died Twice by Edwin Arlington Robinson