NEW YORK – For Louise Erdrich, receiving her latest major literary honor has highlighted an often-overlooked truth: although writing can appear solitary, bringing a book into the world is a deeply collaborative effort.
Erdrich has been named the 2026 recipient of the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, an award established through the will of the late silent-film stars. The prize recognizes “an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life.”
Since its launch in 1994, the Gish Prize has honored an accomplished group of artists, including Bob Dylan, architect Frank Gehry, choreographer Merce Cunningham and filmmaker Ava DuVernay.
Erdrich, 72, joins that distinguished list after an already remarkable career. She won the Pulitzer Prize for her 2020 novel “The Night Watchman,” the National Book Award for “The Round House” in 2012 and the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction in 2015. In a recent telephone interview with The Associated Press, she said learning about the Gish honor led her to explore the sisters’ lives—and to admire the way they recognized every person who contributed to a film.
“They would talk to the stage hands and anyone else who was around, the people who helped put a production together. That’s something very close to my heart,” Erdrich said. Her connection to that idea also comes from running a bookstore. “I love being part of the entire structure of bringing books to people.”
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Like fellow authors Ann Patchett and Lauren Groff, Erdrich understands both sides of the book business: creating stories and connecting them with readers. She co-founded Birchbark Books in Minneapolis in 2001. The independent bookstore promotes “the power of good writing, the beauty of handmade art, the strength of Native culture, and the importance of small and intimate bookstores.” Erdrich, an enrolled member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians, frequently centers Native experiences in her fiction.
In a statement issued Friday, Sara Reisman, a member of the Gish Prize selection committee, said Erdrich’s work has had an “indelible effect on my understanding of Indigenous life.”
Reisman also pointed to Birchbark Books as an extension of Erdrich’s literary mission, calling it “a community-based teaching bookstore with international presence that amplifies the work of Native and non-Native writers (and) celebrates that which makes each of us different.”
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