Links: Peter S. Beagle Homepage / SFRevu Flickr Gallery for the WSFA SPSF Reception / Show Official Info /

The award was presented in a well packed hotel ballroom at Capclave 2007, and (though Swanwick's urging may have had something to do with it) was followed by a standing ovation for the author and work.

The author's acceptance speech (included below) stressed the importance of small press as "the life force behind what we create."

Submissions deadline for the 2008 award is March 1, 2008, and is limited to: Original short fiction works (20,000 words or fewer) of imaginative literature (e.g., science fiction, fantasy, horror, speculative fiction or like literature) published by a small press.

More information about the award can be found at wsfasmallpressaward.org.

Peter S. Beagle's acceptance speech:Source: Ernest Lilley / SFRevu

"My notion of a literary award generally involves first-class flights, lavish financial compensation, incredibly costly dinners, and four star hotel accommodations complete with hot and cold running groupies. The way I look at it, if it's good enough for Harlan, it's good enough for me. I gladly make exception in this case because (and I know this is a cliché), far more than the mighty international conglomerate, it is the small press, the minuscule press, that remains, and will surely remain, the life force behind what we here create.

The saying, freedom of the press belongs to the person who owns one, it is perfectly true; there is a reason that - even in the age of the Internet - dictatorships, juntas and fascist mobs still physically destroy every printing facility they can reach. In the end, and I'm happy to say, and as every jefe maximos, knows literature and literacy itself are always the enemy. And yet somehow - call it samizdat, or anything else you like - the small press survives; the smudgy mimeograph, the battered copier, always rises again from the bloody shambles. Always at whatever cost. Always.

Therefore I am grateful for this award, and will treasure it for everything it represents. Later for the Pulitzer, the National Book Award. This will do fine."