The Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award (known as the SFWA Grand Master Award until 2002) is an award given by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) to living authors (of any nationality) for lifetime achievement.
It is similar to SFWA's Nebula Award—the actual trophy is identical—but it is given to authors rather than to works, and is emphatically not a Nebula.
If you see a Science Fiction writer described as a "Grand Master" on the cover of his or her book, it is almost certainly a reference to this award.
The award has been given out since 1975. It was originally limited to six per decade. This restriction was later lifted, and the award can be given annually, but is not required to be.
The requirement that a recipient be still living at the time of the award may explain some surprising absences from this list.
See also: Nebula Award. Contrast the World Fantasy Award, which includes a lifetime achievement award that is not a separate award.
- Robert A. Heinlein (1975)
- Jack Williamson (1976)
- Clifford Simak (1977)
- L. Sprague de Camp (1979)
- Fritz Leiber (1981)
- Andre Norton (1984)
- Arthur C. Clarke (1986)
- Isaac Asimov (1987)
- Alfred Bester (1988)
- Ray Bradbury (1989)
- Lester del Rey (1991)
- Frederik Pohl (1993)
- Damon Knight (1995)
- A.E. van Vogt (1996)
- Jack Vance (1997)
- Poul Anderson (1998)
- Hal Clement (1999)
- Brian W. Aldiss (2000)
- Philip José Farmer (2001)
- Ursula K. Le Guin (2003)
- Robert Silverberg (2004)
- Anne McCaffrey (2005)
- Harlan Ellison (2006)
- James E. Gunn (2007)
- Michael Moorcock (2008)
- Harry Harrison (2009)
- Joe Haldeman (2010)
- Connie Willis (2012)
- Gene Wolfe (2013)
- Samuel R. Delany (2014)
- Larry Niven (2015)
- C. J. Cherryh (2016)
- Jane Yolen (2017)
- Peter S. Beagle (2018)
- William Gibson (2019)
- Lois McMaster Bujold (2020)
- Nalo Hopkinson (2021)
- Mercedes Lackey (2021)
