Oakland, CA—PEN Oakland announces the winners of the Thirty-Seventh Annual PEN OAKLAND AWARDS. The 2026 PEN Oakland Award winners will be formally recognized on Saturday, December 5, 2026 at 2:00 P.M., at the Oakland Public Library, Rockridge Branch, 5366 College Avenue, Oakland, CA.

Called “The Blue Collar PEN” by The New York Times, and from the city that gave us Jack London, Joaquin Miller, Ina Coolbrith, Huey Newton, Floyd Salas, Gertrude Stein, Shawn Wong, William Wong, Sarah Fabio, Tommy Orange and where Anne Rice, Maya Angelou, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Chester Himes once lived, comes the scrappiest of book awards--one with no corporate ties. An award whose recipients are chosen by working writers, and not hedge fund operators or crypto technocrats.

The 2026 PEN Oakland Award Winners

The Ceremony will Go as Follows:

Josephine Miles Awards:

Walter Mosley

Been Wrong So Long It Feels Like Right: A King Oliver Novel

(Little, Brown and Company)

Kalehua Kim

Mele: Poems (Trio House Press)

Mac Crane

A Sharp Endless Need (The Dial Press)

C.J. Farley

Who Knows You by Heart (William Morrow)

Cathy Linh Che

Becoming Ghost (Washington Square Press)

Devorah Major

Word Time (City Lights Books)

Michael Thomas

The Broken King (Grove Press)

Thea Matthews

Grime (City Lights Books)

Marcus Rediker

Freedom Ship: The Uncharted History of Escaping Slavery by Sea (Viking)

Jack and Adelle Foley Award:

Peter Nicks, filmmaker

William Hearst, III, publisher of “Alta Magazine,” philanthropist

Reginald C. Martin Award for Excellence in Criticism:

Playthell Benjamin, public intellectual

Gary Webb Anti-Censorship Award:

Paul Cobb, publisher of “The Oakland Post”

Boots Riley, filmmaker, rapper, activist and community organizer

Reginald Lockett Lifetime Achievement Award:

Wesley Brown, novelist

Carolyn Forche, poet

The 2026 Board of Directors of PEN Oakland

Opal Palmer Adisa, Robert Mailer Anderson, Carla Blank, Judith Cody, Lucille Lang Day,

Cheryl Fabio, Emil Guillermo, Judy Juanita, Herb Kohl, D. Scot Miller, Linda Noel,

Ishmael Reed, Tennessee Reed, Tess Taylor, Maw Shein Win, Michael Young