Angie Cruz won 2 recent literary prizes

Angie Cruz, associate professor of English in Pitt’s Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences, won the 43rd Dos Passos Prize for Literature and was named a 2025 United States Artists (USA) Fellow.

The Dos Passos Prize for Literature is given annually by Longwood University to a talented American writer who experiments with form, explores a range of voices and merits further recognition. Cruz will receive an honorarium and medal and visit Longwood’s campus this spring to receive the award and read her work at a public ceremony.

Of this year’s 50 USA Fellows, only seven are writers. Cruz will receive a $50,000 unrestricted grant to use “for any purpose, whether that be creating new work, paying rent, reducing debt, obtaining health care or supporting their families.”

Along with directing Pitt’s Writing Program, Cruz is a novelist and editor whose most recent novel, “How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water,” was named to the New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2022. Her 2017 novel “Dominicana” was also heavily awarded, including being the inaugural book pick for Good Morning America’s GMA Book Club and the winner of the ALA/YALSA Alex Award in fiction. She is also the author of two other novels and editor-in-chief of Aster(ix) Journal.

Photography by Aimee Obidzinski