UArizona Professor Manuel Muñoz Receives Joyce Carol Oates Prize

University of Arizona Professor of English Manuel Muñoz, the acclaimed author of The Consequences (Graywolf Press, 2022) and three other works of fiction, has received the 2023 Joyce Carol Oates Prize, sponsored by New Literary Project (NewLit).

According to the NewLit press release, “The annual Prize honors a mid-career author of fiction who has earned a distinguished following and the heartfelt admiration of readers and other writers. The Prize stands not only as testament to momentous accomplishment, but also as encouragement and support for work to come.”

“I am deeply grateful to receive the Joyce Carol Oates Prize and doubly so because I was 11 years between books and without a publisher for a time,” Muñoz said. “My thanks to the many people, near and far, both friends and strangers, who kept encouraging me in my writing so that I could find myself here, stunned and yet elated by this recognition.”

Image

Muñoz, a professor in the UArizona’s MFA in Creative Writing Program, has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts. He has also been recognized with a Whiting Writer’s Award, three O. Henry Awards, and an appearance in Best American Short Stories.

The Joyce Carol Oates Prize, which comes with a $50,000 award, is named for the eminent author, an honorary member of New Literary Project’s Board of Directors.

“The moral intelligence of the author seemed to shine forth,” said Joyce Carol Oates of The Consequences. “The work is suffused with information, exposition very artfully blended in with the narration…Living far away on the East Coast, I am not much familiar with the world of Mexican-American farm workers and their families, but Manuel has made them feel like kin to me.”

##

Content from New Literary Project press release “Manuel Muñoz Receives the 2023 Joyce Carol Oates Prize.”