Nominees of the 2021 Doug Wright Awards

 From Doug Wright Awards.

17th Annual Doug Wright Awards poster by Robb Mirsky.

The Doug Wright Awards are pleased to announce this year’s nominees, selected from works published by Canadian creators in the 2020 calendar year:

The Doug Wright Award for best book

Lonely Boys, S. Bédard, Pow Pow Press

Familiar Face, Michael DeForge, Drawn & Quarterly

Constantly, GG, Koyama Press

Paul at Home, Michel Rabagliati, Drawn & Quarterly

Wendy, Master of Art, Walter Scott, Drawn & Quarterly

The Nipper: The Doug Wright Award for emerging talent

Adam de Souza, A Gleaming No. 2, Self-published

Kimberly Edgar, The Space In Between, Self-published

Veronica Post, Langosh & Peppi: Fugitive Days, Conundrum Press

Courtney Loberg, We Don’t Go Through the Angelgrass I, Self-published

Shannon M. Reeves, Restless Bones, Gytha Press

The Pigskin Peters: The Doug Wright Award for best small- or micro-press book

The Noiseless Din, Scott Carruthers, Popnoir Editions

The Desecration, Scott Carruthers and Sally McKay, Self-published

A Gleaming No. 2, Adam de Souza, Self-published
The Space In Between, Kimberly Edgar, Self-published

Awkward Pause, Ryan Harby, Renegade Arts Entertainment

The Egghead: The Doug Wright Award for best kids’ book

A Slug Story, Mandi Kujawa, Hana Kujawa, Claude St. Aubin, and Lovern Kindzierski, Renegade Arts Entertainment

The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt, Riel Nason and Byron Eggenschwiler, Tundra Books

Okay, Universe: Chronicles of a Woman in Politics, Valérie Plante and Delphie Côté-Lacroix, Drawn & Quarterly

Grandmother School, Rina Singh and Ellen Rooney, Orca Book Publishers

Swift Fox All Along, Rebecca Thomas and Maya McKibbin, Annick Press

Drawn & Quarterly leads as the publisher of the most nominated books, with four, followed by Renegade Arts Entertainment, with two.

This year, 147 books by Canadian authors and artists were submitted to the Doug Wright Awards, in four categories. 

Nominees and winners were chosen by a panel of three judges per category. Books from more than 30 publishers were submitted, along with nearly three dozen self-published works.

Each winner will receive a small cash prize, and the winner of The Nipper will be awarded a weeklong retreat at the Valleyview Artist Retreat, in Caledon, Ontario. 

All entrants to The Pigskin Peters will receive a one-year subscription to Broken Pencil. 

Giants of the North: The Canadian Cartoonist Hall of Fame

This year we are again pushing the induction of our living Giant of the North inductee until such time as a live public ceremony is again possible.

This year’s Giants of the North nominee is Fred Kelly (1921–2005), a writer and artist best known for his work with Bell Features during the post–Second World War “Canadian Whites” era, in particular his creation of the character Mr. Monster.

The Ceremony

The 2021 Doug Wright Awards will be broadcast as a pre-recorded livestream, on Facebook and YouTube, on Saturday, May 8th, at 8 p.m. ET, hosted by Don McKellar.

About the Doug Wright Awards

The Doug Wright Awards were founded in 2005 to celebrate excellence in the field pf Canadian comics. The awards are named for Doug Wright (1917–1983), the creator of the long-running strip Doug Wright’s Family (a.k.a. Nipper), one of the most widely read and loved Canadian comics of the twentieth century.