Pulitzer Prizes 2010s: A decade of winners
The 2010s represented a pivotal moment for American literature, and the Pulitzer Prizes—that most prestigious of literary honors—captured something essential about where our culture was heading. The decade opened with Paul Harding’s luminous Tinkers, a meditation on memory and mortality that felt almost elegiac for the pre-digital world we were leaving behind, while closing with Richard Powers’ sprawling The Overstory, an ambitious novel grappling with environmental collapse and activism. These bookends tell you something about the trajectory: the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winners and their decade-long counterparts were increasingly wrestling with urgent contemporary questions, even as they maintained fiction’s commitment to psychological depth and formal innovation.
What’s striking about tracking the Pulitzer Prize winners across these ten years is how the awards seemed to actively reflect—and perhaps even accelerate—cultural shifts. Ron Chernow’s Washington: A Life and Eric Foner’s The Fiery Trial dominated the early years with grand historical biographies, while later winners like Matthew Desmond’s Evicted and Heather Ann Thompson’s Blood in the Water brought urgent social reckoning into the nonfiction spotlight. The drama categories proved particularly alive to contemporary voices: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton in 2016 was the decade’s cultural earthquake, but that victory arrived alongside thoughtful, politically engaged plays from Bruce Norris, Ayad Akhtar, and Lynn Nottage. These winners didn’t simply reflect America back to itself—they challenged it, provoked it, and expanded what the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and other categories could represent.
For a full look at how these awards shaped literary discourse across the entire decade, explore our complete rundown of 2010s Pulitzer Prize winners below.
2010
Biography
The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt by T.J. Stiles
Drama
Next to Normal by Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey
Fiction
- Tinkers by Paul Harding
General Nonfiction
The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and Its Dangerous Legacy by David E. Hoffman
History
Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World by Liaquat Ahamed
Poetry
- Versed by Rae Armantrout
2011
Biography
Washington : A Life by Ron Chernow
Drama
Clybourne Park by Bruce Norris
Fiction
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
General Nonfiction
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee
History
The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery by Eric Foner
Poetry
- The Best of It: New and Selected Poems by Kay Ryan
2012
Biography
George F. Kennan: An American Life by John Lewis Gaddis
Drama
- Water by the Spoonful by Quiara Alegría Hudes
General Nonfiction
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt
History
Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable
Poetry
Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith
2013
Biography
Drama
Disgraced by Ayad Akhtar
Fiction
The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson
General Nonfiction
Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America by Gilbert King
History
- Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam by Fredrik Logevall
Poetry
Stag’s Leap by Sharon Olds
2014
Biography
- Margaret Fuller: A New American Life by Megan Marshall
Drama
The Flick by Annie Baker
Fiction
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
General Nonfiction
Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation by Dan Fagin
History
The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832 by Alan Taylor
Poetry
3 Sections by Vijay Seshadri
2015
Biography
- The Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in Europe by David I. Kertzer
Drama
- Between Riverside and Crazy by Stephen Adly Guirgis
Fiction
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
General Nonfiction
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert
History
- Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People by Elizabeth A. Fenn
Poetry
Digest by Gregory Pardlo
2016
Biography
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan
Drama
- Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda
Fiction
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
General Nonfiction
Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS by Joby Warrick
History
- Custer’s Trials: A Life on the Frontier of a New America by T.J. Stiles
Poetry
- Ozone Journal by Peter Balakian
2017
Biography
- The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar
Drama
- Sweat by Lynn Nottage
Fiction
The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
General Nonfiction
Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond
History
Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy by Heather Ann Thompson
Poetry
Olio by Tyehimba Jess
2018
Biography
Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Caroline Fraser
Drama
- Cost of Living by Martyna Majok
Fiction
- Less by Andrew Sean Greer
General Nonfiction
Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America by James Forman Jr.
History
The Gulf: The Making of an American Sea by Jack E. Davis
Poetry
Half-light: Collected Poems 1965-2016 by Frank Bidart
2019
Biography
The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke by Jeffrey C. Stewart
Drama
- Fairview by Jackie Sibblies Drury
Fiction
The Overstory by Richard Powers
General Nonfiction
- Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America by Eliza Griswold
History
Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom by David W. Blight
Poetry
Be With by Forrest Gander