Awards & Honors

Literary Awards & Grants

  • Longview Foundation Prize for Fiction (Saul Bellow, judge): 1959
  • Rockefeller Foundation Grant for Fiction: 1965-66
  • Guggenheim Foundation Grant for Fiction: 1970-71
  • Martha Foley's Best American Short Stories: 1959, 1961, 1962, 1968, 1980
  • Also included in the Martha Foley anthology of best American short stories: 200 Hundred Years of Great American Short Stories, 1976
  • The Pushcart Prize, 1976, 1983, 1987, 1992
  • Indiana University Writers' Conference Award for Fiction, 1968
  • Yaddo Writers' Colony: 1968, 1969
  • Chicago Tribune Writers' and Critics' Poll: one of the ten best American writers, 1973
  • American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award for Fiction, 1975
  • American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Medal of Merit for Fiction, 1979
  • Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1982
  • Elected to the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, 1983
  • The National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism for Habitations of the Word, 1985
  • Selected for The Best American Essays for 1986 by Elizabeth Hardwick
  • Selected for The Best American Essays for 1992 by Susan Sontag
  • Selected for The Best American Essays for 1994 by Jamaica Kincaid
  • Selected for The Best American Essays for 1998 by Cynthia Ozick
  • Selected for The Best American Essays for 2000 by Alan Lightman
  • Selected for The Best American Essays of the Century by Oates and Atwan
  • Placed on the Agrégation in France, 1992
  • Mark Twain Award for Distinguished Contribution to the Literature of the Midwest by the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature, 1994
  • St. Louis Arts and Education Award, 1996
  • Yale Review Essay Prize for "Mississippi," 1995
  • Nomination: the Pen-Faulkner Prize for The Tunnel, 1996
  • American Book Award for The Tunnel, 1996
  • The National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism for Finding a Form, 1997
  • Lannan Foundation: Lifetime Achievement Award, 1997
  • Star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame, 1998
  • First Pen/Nabokov Award, 2000
  • The National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism for Tests of Time, 2003
  • The Pen Spielvogel/Diamondstein Award for the Essay for Tests of Time, 2003
  • Washington University Celebration, 80th Birthday, Oct. 2004
  • Lannan Literary Fellowship, 2005
  • Chair in the name of William H. Gass established in the humanities at Washington University, St. Louis, November 2006. Professor Mabel Mirana installed
  • The Truman Capote Award for Literary Criticism (A Temple of Texts) 2007
  • The St. Louis University Library Literary Award, 2007
  • O'Henry Prize for the Short Story, 2007

Honorary Degrees

  • Doctor of Humane Letters, Kenyon College, 1974
  • Doctor of Humane Letters, George Washington University, 1982
  • Doctor of Humane Letters, Purdue University, 1985
  • Doctor of Humane Letters, Washington University, 2005
  • Doctor of Humane Letters, Kalamazoo College, 2005