$60,000 Prize Announced for Canadian Non-Fiction

The new Writers' Trust Hilary Weston Prize will be the biggest non-fiction award in Canada.

A new $60,000 prize will be awarded each year to the best Canadian work of non-fiction starting this October. Former Ontario lieutenant-governor Hilary Weston will sponsor the eponymous Writers' Trust Hilary Weston Prize, which will have a shortlist of five nominated authors, one of whom will walk away with the country's richest prize for non-fiction. The other four will receive $5,000 each. Weston was instrumental in revitalizing the Royal Ontario Museum after her term as the Queen's representative in Ontario came to a close in 2002. She said she hopes the new award will carry forward Canada's strong non-fiction tradition, popularized by such authors as Northrop Frye, Marshall McLuhan, and Margaret MacMillan.