2025 | 24th Thurber Prize

2025 Winner

Alexandra Petri’s US History — Alexandra Petri

2025 Finalists

Griefstrike! — Jason Roeder

The Society of Shame — Jane Roper

2024 | 23rd Thurber Prize

2024 Winner

The Lemon — S.E. Boyd

2024 Finalists

Disorientation — Elaine Hsieh Chou

Ms. Demeanor — Elinor Lipman

2023 | 22nd Thurber Prize

2023 Winner

The Guncle — Steven Rowley

2023 Finalists

You’re Leaving When? Adventures in Downward Mobility — Annabelle Gurwitch

The Ugly Cry — Danielle Henderson

2022 | 21st Thurber Prize

2022 Winner

Deacon King Kong — James McBride

2022 Finalists

The New One: Painfully True Stories from a Reluctant Dad — Mike Birbiglia

Nothing Is Wrong and Here Is Why — Alexandra Petri

2021 | 20th Thurber Prize

2021 Winner

What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker — Damon Young

2021 Finalists

Lessons from Lucy — Dave Barry

Hollow Kingdom — Kira Jane Buxton

2019 | 19th Thurber Prize

2019 Winner

Hits & Misses — Simon Rich

2019 Finalists

Look Alive Out There — Sloane Crosley

Love Poems for Married People — John Kenney

2018 | 18th Thurber Prize

2018 Winner

Priestdaddy — Patricia Lockwood

2018 Finalists

Would Everybody Please Stop?: Reflections on Life and Other Bad Ideas — Jenny Allen

Vactionland: True Stories from Painful Beaches — John Hodgman

2017 | 17th Thurber Prize

2017 Winner

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood — Trevor Noah

2017 Finalists

Amp'd — Ken Pisani

Mr. Eternity — Aaron Thier

2016 | 16th Thurber Prize

2016 Winner

The World's Largest Man — Harrison Scott Key

2016 Finalists

Little Victories — Jason Gay

Between You & Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen — Mary Norris

2015 | 15th Thurber Prize

2015 Winner

Dear Committee Members — Julie Schumacher

2015 Finalists

Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? — Roz Chast

I See You Made an Effort: Compliments, Indignities, and Survival Stories from the Edge of 50 — Annabelle Gurwitch

2014 | 14th Thurber Prize

2014 Winner

Truth in Advertising — John Kenney

2014 Finalists

Women on Men — Liza Donnelly

This Land Was Made for You and Me (But Mostly Me) — Bruce McCall and David Letterman

2013 | 13th Thurber Prize

2013 Winner

Dan Gets a Minivan: Life at the Intersection of Dude and Dad — Dan Zevin

2013 Finalists

Hope, A Tragedy — Shalom Auslander

Lunatics: A Novel — Dave Barry and Alan Zweibel

2012 | 12th Thurber Prize

2012 Winner

Quite Enough of Calvin Trillin: Forty Years of Funny Stuff — Calvin Trillin

2012 Finalists

Pawnee: The Greatest Town in America — Nate DiMeo and the creative team of Parks and Recreation

Starting From Happy — Patricia Marx

2011 | 11th Thurber Prize

2011 Winner

Half Empty — David Rakoff

2011 Finalists

Sports from Hell — Rick Reilly

Sleepwalk with Me — Mike Birbiglia

2010 | 10th Thurber Prize

2010 Winner

How I Became a Famous Novelist — Steve Hely

2010 Finalists

Why Is My Mother Getting a Tattoo — Jancee Dunn

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress — Rhoda Janzen

2009 | 9th Thurber Prize

2009 Winner

Lamentations of the Father — Ian Frazier

2009 Finalists

I Was Told There'd Be Cake — Sloane Crosley

Wrack and Ruin — Don Lee

The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death — Laurie Notaro

2008 | 8th Thurber Prize

2008 Winner

I Love You, Beth Cooper — Larry Doyle

2008 Finalists

Him Her Him Again The End of Him — Patricia Marx

Ant Farm and Other Desperate Situations — Simon Rich

2007 | 7th Thurber Prize

2007 Winner

My Lucky Star — Joe Keenan

2007 Finalists

Walking in Circles Before Lying Down — Merrill Markoe

I Shouldn’t Even Be Doing This and Other Things That Strike Me Funny — Bob Newhart

2006 | 6th Thurber Prize

2006 Winner

The Other Shulman — Alan Zweibel

2006 Finalists

Time Won’t Let Me — Bill Scheft

Texas Hold ‘Em — Kinky Friedman

2005 | 5th Thurber Prize

2005 Winner

The Daily Show, America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction — Jon Stewart and the writers of The Daily Show

2005 Finalists

The Borowitz Report: The Big Book of Shockers — Andy Borowitz

Funny in Farsi — Firoozeh Dumas

2004 | 4th Thurber Prize

2004 Winner

No Way to Treat a First Lady — Christopher Buckley

2004 Finalists

Me and Orson Welles — Robert Kaplow

The Day I Turned Uncool — Dan Zevin

2001 | 3rd Thurber Prize

2001 Winner

Me Talk Pretty One Day — David Sedaris

2001 Special Honor Book

Big Kiss — Henry Alford

2001 Finalists

The Trillionaire Next Door — Andy Borowitz

In a Sunburned Country — Bill Bryson

Men My Mother Dated — Brett Leveridge

It Takes a Village Idiot — Jim Mullen

1999 | 2nd Thurber Prize

1999 Winner

Our Dumb Century: 100 Years of Headlines from America’s Finest News Source — The editors of The Onion

1997 | 1st Thurber Prize

1997 Winner

Coyote v. Acme — Ian Frazier

1997 Honor Books

Naked — David Sedaris

Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations — Al Franken