The WH Smith Literary Award was an award founded in 1959 by British high street retailer WH Smith to "encourage and bring international esteem to authors of the British Commonwealth". Originally open to all residents of the UK, the Commonwealth and Ireland, it later admitted foreign works in translation and works by US authors. The final three winners were Americans (Philip Roth, Donna Tartt and Richard Powers), and 2005 was the award's final year.WH Smith Literary Award at aLibraryThing
The WH Smith Illustration Award ran from 1987 to 1994.
The WH Smith Mind-Boggling Book Award for children's literature ran from 1993 to 1996.
WH Smith sponsors the National Book Awards Children's Book of the Year (the "British Children's Book Award" through 2009).
Winners Year Author Title1959 Patrick White Voss1960 Laurie Lee Cider With Rosie1961 Nadine Gordimer Friday's Footprint1962 J. R. Ackerley We Think the World of You1963 Gabriel Fielding The Birthday King1964 Ernst Gombrich Meditations on a Hobby-Horse1965 Leonard Woolf Beginning Again1966 R. C. Hutchinson A Child Possessed1967 Jean Rhys Wide Sargasso Sea1968 V. S. Naipaul The Mimic Men1969 Robert Gittings John Keats1970 John Fowles The French Lieutenant's Woman1971 Nan Fairbrother New Lives, New Landscapes1972 Kathleen Raine The Lost Country1973 Brian Moore Catholics1974 Anthony Powell Temporary Kings1975 Jon Stallworthy Wilfred Owen1976 Seamus Heaney North1977 Ronald Lewin Slim: The Standardbearer1978 Patrick Leigh Fermor A Time of Gifts1979 Mark Girouard Life in the English Country House1980 Thom Gunn Selected Poems 1950–19751981 Isabel Colegate The Shooting Party1982 George Clare Last Waltz in Vienna1983 A. N. Wilson Wise Virgin1984 Philip Larkin Required Writing1985 David Hughes The Pork Butcher1986 Doris Lessing The Good Terrorist1987 Elizabeth Jennings Collected Poems 1953–19851988 Robert Hughes The Fatal Shore1989 Christopher Hill A Turbulent, Seditious and Factious People: John Bunyan and His Church1990 V. S. Pritchett A Careless Widow and Other Stories1991 Derek Walcott Omeros1992 Thomas Pakenham The Scramble for Africa1993 Michèle Roberts Daughters of the House1994 Vikram Seth A Suitable Boy1995 Alice Munro Open Secrets1996 Simon Schama Landscape and Memory1997 Orlando Figes A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution 1891–19241998 Ted Hughes Tales from Ovid1999 Beryl Bainbridge Master Georgie2000 Melvyn Bragg The Soldier's Return2001 Philip Roth The Human Stain2002 Ian McEwan Atonement2003 Donna Tartt The Little Friend2004 Richard Powers The Time of Our Singing2005 Philip Roth The Plot Against America
WH Smith Mind-Boggling Book Award For a few years, W H Smith also offered a children's book award. The judges were children between nine and twelve, and the intention was to promote books which were "accessible to children in content and price, as well as offering a gripping read."
The winners were:
1993: Philip Ridley, Krindlekrax 1994: Malorie Blackman, Hacker 1995: Maggie Prince, Memoirs of a Dangerous Alien 1996: Sharon Creech, Walk Two Moons
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