The PEN/Faulkner Foundation has chosen David Means as the winner of the 2025 PEN/Bernard and Ann Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story, which recognizes writers who have demonstrated exceptional achievement in the short story form. Means will be honored at the annual PEN/Malamud Award Ceremony, held in partnership with American University, in December.
"David Means has demonstrated an extraordinary commitment to the short story form throughout his decades-long career," said Malamud committee chair Jung Yun. "His six collections to date serve to remind readers how finely observed, emotionally compelling, and formally inventive a short story can be, particularly in the hands of a craftsperson like Means who possesses such a clear understanding of the powers and pleasures of the form. Like Bernard Malamud himself, he packs 'a self or two into a few pages, predicating lifetimes,' leaving readers with memories of small, profoundly human moments that are difficult to forget."
Means's story collections include Two Nurses; Smoking; Instructions for a Funeral; The Spot; Assorted Fire Events, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; and The Secret Goldfish. His recent novel Hystopia was longlisted for the Booker Prize.
"I'm deeply honored to receive the PEN/Malamud Award--to be associated with Bernard Malamud and to stand alongside so many practitioners of the short story form," said Means. "The short story feels intrinsic to the human condition, as natural as drinking water or sharing love. It's a singular tool for probing the human experience, illuminating the universals of who we are. The form also feels especially suited to exploring the nature of life in the United States: a country vast and varied, best captured in the precise, revealing glimpses stories can offer. I'm profoundly grateful to the PEN/Faulkner Foundation and the PEN/Malamud Award committee for their support of the short story in these trying times."