# Georg Büchner Prize

The Georg Büchner Prize (German: Georg-Büchner-Preis) is the most important literary prize for German language literature. The award is named after dramatist and writer Georg Büchner, author of Woyzeck and Leonce and Lena. The Georg Büchner Prize is awarded annually for authors "writing in the German language who have notably emerged through their oeuvre as essential contributors to the shaping of contemporary German cultural life".

## History

The Georg Büchner Prize was created in 1923 in memory of Georg Büchner and was only given to artists who came from or were closely tied to Büchner's home of Hesse. It was first awarded in 1923. Among the early recipients were mostly visual artists, poets, actors, and singers.
In 1951, the prize changed to a general literary prize, awarded annually by the Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung. It goes to German language authors, and the annual speech by the recipient takes place in Darmstadt. Since 2002, the prize has been endowed with €50,000.

## The Georg Büchner Prize and the Nobel Prize in Literature

Five winners of the Georg Büchner Prize, Günter Grass (1965), Heinrich Böll (1967), Elias Canetti (1972), Peter Handke (1973) and Elfriede Jelinek (1998) have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in subsequent years. The Georg Büchner Prize is frequently seen as an indicator for potential future Nobel Prize winners writing in the German language. Most recently, however, the Swedish Academy in Stockholm preceded the German Academy for Language and Literature in awarding a prolific writer from the German sprachraum. Herta Müller received the Nobel Prize in Literature but has not yet been awarded the Georg Büchner Prize.

## Recipients of the literary prize, since 1951

| Year | Name | Nationality | Notes |
| 1951 | Gottfried Benn | West Germany | |
| 1952 | not given | | |
| 1953 | Ernst Kreuder | West Germany | |
| 1954 | Martin Kessel | West Germany | |
| 1955 | Marie Luise Kaschnitz | West Germany | |
| 1956 | Karl Krolow | West Germany | |
| 1957 | Erich Kästner | West Germany | |
| 1958 | Max Frisch | Switzerland | |
| 1959 | Günter Eich | West Germany | |
| 1960 | Paul Celan | France / Romania | |
| 1961 | Hans Erich Nossack | West Germany | |
| 1962 | Wolfgang Koeppen | West Germany | |
| 1963 | Hans Magnus Enzensberger | West Germany | |
| 1964 | Ingeborg Bachmann | Austria | |
| 1965 | Günter Grass | West Germany | |
| 1966 | Wolfgang Hildesheimer | West Germany | |
| 1967 | Heinrich Böll | West Germany | |
| 1968 | Golo Mann | West Germany | |
| 1969 | Helmut Heißenbüttel | West Germany | |
| 1970 | Thomas Bernhard | Austria | |
| 1971 | Uwe Johnson | West Germany | |
| 1972 | Elias Canetti | Bulgaria | |
| 1973 | Peter Handke | Austria | refunded the prize money in 1999 as a sign of protest against the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia |
| 1974 | Hermann Kesten | West Germany | |
| 1975 | Manès Sperber | Austria / France | |
| 1976 | Heinz Piontek | West Germany | |
| 1977 | Reiner Kunze | West Germany | |
| 1978 | Hermann Lenz | West Germany | |
| 1979 | Ernst Meister | West Germany | posthumous |
| 1980 | Christa Wolf | East Germany | |
| 1981 | Martin Walser | West Germany | |
| 1982 | Peter Weiss | Sweden | posthumous |
| 1983 | Wolfdietrich Schnurre | West Germany | |
| 1984 | Ernst Jandl | Austria | |
| 1985 | Heiner Müller | East Germany | |
| 1986 | Friedrich Dürrenmatt | Switzerland | |
| 1987 | Erich Fried | Austria | |
| 1988 | Albert Drach | Austria | |
| 1989 | Botho Strauß | West Germany | |
| 1990 | Tankred Dorst | Germany | |
| 1991 | Wolf Biermann | Germany | |
| 1992 | George Tabori | Hungary | |
| 1993 | Peter Rühmkorf | Germany | |
| 1994 | Adolf Muschg | Switzerland | |
| 1995 | Durs Grünbein | Germany | |
| 1996 | Sarah Kirsch | Germany | |
| 1997 | Hans Carl Artmann | Austria | |
| 1998 | Elfriede Jelinek | Austria | |
| 1999 | Arnold Stadler | Germany | |
| 2000 | Volker Braun | Germany | |
| 2001 | Friederike Mayröcker | Austria | |
| 2002 | Wolfgang Hilbig | Germany | |
| 2003 | Alexander Kluge | Germany | |
| 2004 | Wilhelm Genazino | Germany | |
| 2005 | Brigitte Kronauer | Germany | |
| 2006 | Oskar Pastior | Germany / Romania | posthumous |
| 2007 | Martin Mosebach | Germany | |
| 2008 | Josef Winkler | Austria | |
| 2009 | Walter Kappacher | Austria | |
| 2010 | Reinhard Jirgl | Germany | |
| 2011 | Friedrich Christian Delius | Germany | |
| 2012 | Felicitas Hoppe | Germany | |
| 2013 | Sibylle Lewitscharoff | Germany | |
| 2014 | Jürgen Becker | Germany | |
| 2015 | Rainald Goetz | Germany | |
| 2016 | Marcel Beyer | Germany | |
| 2017 | Jan Wagner | Germany | |
| 2018 | Terézia Mora | Hungary | |
| 2019 | Lukas Bärfuss | Switzerland | |
| 2020 | Elke Erb | Germany | |
| 2021 | Clemens J. Setz | Austria | |
| 2022 | Emine Sevgi Özdamar | Germany / Turkey | |
| 2023 | Lutz Seiler | Germany | |
| 2024 | Oswald Egger | Italy | |

## Recipients 1923–50

* 1923 Adam Karrillon (1853–1938) and Arnold Mendelssohn (1855–1933)
* 1924 Alfred Bock (1859–1932) and Paul Thesing [de] (1882–1954)
* 1925 Wilhelm Michel (1877–1942) and Rudolf Koch (1876–1934)
* 1926 Christian Heinrich Kleukens [de] (1880–1954) and Wilhelm Petersen (1890–1957)
* 1927 Kasimir Edschmid (1890–1966) and Johannes Bischoff [de] (1890–1957)
* 1928 Richard Hoelscher (1867–1943) and Well Habicht [de] (1884–1966)
* 1929 Carl Zuckmayer (1896–1977) and Adam Antes (1891–1984)
* 1930 Nikolaus Schwarzkopf [de] (1884–1962) and Johannes Lippmann [de] (1858–1935)
* 1931 Alexander Posch (1890–1950) and Hans Simon [de] (1897–1982)
* 1932 Albert H. Rausch [de] (1882–1949) and Adolf Bode [de] (1904–1970)
* 1933–44 not given
* 1945 Hans Schiebelhuth (1895–1944)
* 1946 Fritz Usinger (1895–1982)
* 1947 Anna Seghers (1900–1983)
* 1948 Hermann Heiss (1897–1967)
* 1949 Carl Gunschmann [de] (1895–1984)
* 1950 Elisabeth Langgässer (1899–1950)