Annal:2006 Pulitzer Prize for Biography
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Pulitzer Prize in the year 2006. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer
- 2006 Pulitzer–Biography winner
- 2005 NBCC–Biography winner
- Score: 20.56
American Prometheus is the first full-scale biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, “father of the atomic bomb,” the brilliant, charismatic physicist who led the effort to capture the awesome fire of the sun for his country in time of war. Immediately after Hiroshima, he became the most famous scientist of his generation–one of the iconic figures of the twentieth century, the embodiment of modern man confronting the consequences of scientific progress.
He was the author of a radical proposal to place international controls over atomic materials–an idea…
The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism
- 2006 Pulitzer–Biography finalist
- Score: 6.56
Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia Peabody were in many ways our American Bronts. The story of these remarkable sisters and their central role in shaping the thinking of their day has never before been fully told. Twenty years in the making, Megan Marshall’s monumental biography brings to new life the era of creative ferment known as the American Renaissance.
Elizabeth, the oldest sister, was a mind-on-fire thinker. A powerful influence on the great writers of the era Emerson, Hawthorne, and Thoreau among them she also published some of their earliest works. It was…
- 2005 NBA–Nonfiction winner
- 2006 Pulitzer–Biography finalist
- 2005 NBCC–Autobiography finalist
- Score: 22.55
From one of America’s iconic writers, a stunning book of electric honesty and passion. Joan Didion explores an intensely personal yet universal experience: a portrait of a marriage—and a life, in good times and bad—that will speak to anyone who has ever loved a husband or wife or child.
Several days before Christmas 2003, John Gregory Dunne and Joan Didion saw their only daughter, Quintana, fall ill with what seemed at first flu, then pneumonia, then complete septic shock. She was put into an induced coma and placed on life support. Days later—the night…
