The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards were setup in 1985 to honour the contributions of writers in Australia. Today it is one of the most well known set of awards. Overall there is a suite of awards which cover:

  • fiction
  • non fiction
  • drama
  • poetry
  • young writers
  • indigenous writing

From this pool of winners, they then have the opportunity to contest the Victorian Prize for Literature with a grand prize of $100,000. This is the largest prize award for writing in all of Australia.

Included in this pool is the People’s Choice Award which receives an additional prize.

Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards Prizes

The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards prizes are as follows:

Individual Category Prizes: $25,000

Victorian Prize for Literature: $100,000

People’s Choice Award: $2,000

Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards Eligibility

With any submission, a maximum of two authors are permitted.

Authors must be Australian citizens or permanent residents at the point of entry.

Authors can only enter into one category for the awards, except for the Award for Indigenous Writing.

All books entered into the Awards must be published and must not be short stories, other than in a published collection from a single author.

Ebooks and self published works are permitted if this is the original format they were published at the time of the award entry.

Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards History

The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards were inaugurated by The Hon. John Cain, Premier of Victoria in 1985, to mark the centenary of the births of Vance and Nettie Palmer and to honour and reward literary achievement by Australian writers.

The awards have received bipartisan support since their inception. The Victorian government has established the following vision and aims for the Awards:

  • to promote Victorian leadership by honouring Australian literature, ideas, innovation and learning;
  • recognise excellence in Australian writing and in contributions to the development of Australian culture;
  • advance the Victorian community’s appreciation of Australian literature and encourage commitment to reading;
  • assist living authors in their careers and promote Victoria’s literary and publishing industries.

The Awards are administered by the Wheeler Centre on behalf of the Premier of Victoria.