| RBC Taylor Prize | |
| Awarded For: | English-language Canadian literary non-fiction work |
| Presenter: | RBC Wealth Management and the Charles Taylor Foundation |
| Country: | Canada |
| Year: | 2000 |
| Year2: | 2020 |
The RBC Taylor Prize (2000–2020), formerly known as the Charles Taylor Prize, was a Canadian literary award, presented by the Charles Taylor Foundation to the best Canadian work of literary non-fiction. It was named for Charles P. B. Taylor, a noted Canadian historian and writer. Instituted in 2000, the 2020 prize was the final year the prize was awarded.[1] [2] The prize was originally presented every two years until 2004, and became an annual award from 2004 onwards. The monetary value of the award increased over the years. The final award in 2020 had a monetary value of $30,000.
The award adopted its present name in December 2013, when RBC Wealth Management was announced as the new corporate sponsor.[3] In addition, under RBC's sponsorship the award added a second $10,000 award for an emerging Canadian literary non-fiction writer between the ages of 18 and 35, to be chosen by the winner of the main award. This award was presented for the first time at the 2014 ceremony.
In 2018 the new RBC Taylor Prize Emerging Writers Mentorship Program was unveiled. This was a professional development program designed to support the next generation of Canadian writers and was part of the RBC Taylor Prize Emerging Writers Award, a distinction that was given annually to a Canadian author whose work embodies the pursuit of excellence in literary non-fiction.
The mentorship program was made available to five Canadian non-fiction writers, who were selected in partnership with a national network of university and college writing programs. These students were paired with the 2018 RBC Taylor Prize shortlisted authors, who would help support their career development and growth.
In 2020, the organizers announced that the 2020 award would be the final presentation of the award.[4]
| 2000 | Baltimore's Mansion | Winner | [5] | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and North America in the Nineteenth Century | Finalist | |||
| Always Give a Penny to a Blind Man | ||||
| Losing the Dead | ||||
| 2002 | Jane Austen | Winner | ||
| Notes from the Hyena's Belly: Memories of my Ethiopian Boyhood | Finalist | |||
| The Geometry of Love: Space, Time, Mystery and Meaning in an Ordinary Church | ||||
| The Spinster and the Prophet: Florence Deeks, H.G. Wells and the Mystery of the Purloined Past | ||||
| Things That Must Not Be Forgotten: A Childhood in Wartime China | ||||
| Time Lord: The Remarkable Canadian who Missed His Train and Changed the World | ||||
| 2004 | Belonging: Home Away From Home | Winner | ||
| If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? | Finalist | |||
| In the Shadow of Silence: From Hitler Youth to Allied Internment, A Young Woman's Story of Truth and Denial | ||||
| Lake of the Prairies: A Story of Belonging | ||||
| Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World | ||||
| 2005 | The Last Heathen: Encounters with Ghosts and Ancestors in Melanesia | Winner | ||
| A War Against Truth: An Intimate Account of the Invasion of Iraq | Finalist | |||
| Acquainted With the Night: Excursions Through the World After Dark | ||||
| There is a Season: A Memoir in the Garden | ||||
| 2006 | Dead Man in Paradise | Winner | ||
| Curse of the Narrows: the Halifax Explosion of 1917 | Finalist | |||
| The Boys, or Waiting for the Electrician's Daughter | ||||
| The Greek for Love: A Memoir of Corfu | ||||
| 2007 | Of This Earth: A Mennonite Boyhood in the Boreal Forest | Winner | ||
| Citizen of the World: The Life of Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Vol. One: 1919-1968 | Finalist | |||
| The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism | ||||
| 2008 | John A.: The Man Who Made Us: The Life and Times of John A. Macdonald, Vol. One: 1815-1867 | Winner | ||
| From Harvey River: A Memoir of My Mother and Her People | Finalist | |||
| Kasztner's Train: The True Story of Rezso Kasztner, Unknown Hero of the Holocaust | ||||
| Lost Genius: The Story of a Forgotten Musical Maverick | ||||
| The Film Club: A True Story of a Father and Son | ||||
| 2009 | Shock Troops: Canadians Fighting the Great War 1917-1918 | Winner | ||
| Angel of Vengeance: The Girl Assassin, the Governor of St. Petersburg and Russia's Revolutionary World | Finalist | |||
| Sugar: A Bittersweet History | ||||
| 2010 | The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Search For His Disabled Son | Winner | ||
| Just Watch Me: The Life of Pierre Elliott Trudeau, 1968-2000 | Finalist | |||
| René Lévesque | ||||
| The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst | ||||
| 2011 | Mordecai: The Life & Times | Winner | ||
| Defiant Spirits: The Modernist Revolution of the Group of Seven | Finalist | |||
| On the Farm: Robert William Pickton and the Tragic Story of Vancouver’s Missing Women | ||||
| The Geography of Arrival: A Memoir | ||||
| The Love Queen of Malabar: Memoir of a Friendship with Kamala Das | ||||
| 2012 | Winner | |||
| Afflictions & Departures: Essays | Finalist | |||
| Eating Dirt: Deep Forests, Big Timber and Life with the Tree-Planting Tribe | ||||
| Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest | ||||
| The Measure of a Man: The Story of a Father, a Son and a Suit | ||||
| 2013 | Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith: Religion in American War and Diplomacy | Winner | [6] | |
| Journey with No Maps: A Life of P.K. Page | Finalist | |||
| Leonardo and The Last Supper | ||||
| The Pursuit of Perfection: A Life of Celia Franca | ||||
| Warlords: Borden, Mackenzie King, and Canada’s World Wars | ||||
| 2014 | The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America | Winner | [7] | |
| Arthur Erickson: An Architect’s Life | Finalist | [8] | ||
| The Dogs Are Eating Them Now: Our War in Afghanistan | ||||
| The Massey Murder: A Maid, Her Master, and the Trial That Shocked a Country | ||||
| The Once and Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be | ||||
| 2015 | They Left Us Everything | Winner | [9] | |
| And Home Was Kariakoo: A Memoir of East Africa | Finalist | |||
| Boundless: Tracing Land and Dream in a New Northwest Passage | ||||
| One Day in August: The Untold Story Behind Canada’s Tragedy at Dieppe | ||||
| The Last Asylum: A Memoir of Madness in Our Times | ||||
| 2016 | Stalin’s Daughter: The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva | Winner | [10] [11] | |
| Dispatches from the Front: The Life of Matthew Halton, Canada’s Voice at War | Finalist | [12] [13] | ||
| Sixty: The Beginning of the End, or the End of the Beginning? | ||||
| The Reason You Walk | ||||
| This Is Happy | ||||
| 2017 | Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies | Winner | [14] | |
| By Chance Alone: A Remarkable True Story of Courage and Survival at Auschwitz | Finalist | [15] | ||
| Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World | ||||
| Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier’s Story | [16] | |||
| This Is Not My Life: A Memoir of Love, Prison, and Other Complications | [17] | |||
| 2018 | Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City | Winner | [18] | |
| In the Name of Humanity | Finalist | [19] [20] | ||
| Island of the Blue Foxes: Disaster and Triumph on Bering’s Great Voyage to Alaska | ||||
| Life on the Ground Floor: Letters from the Edge of Emergency Medicine | ||||
| Yardwork: A Biography of an Urban Place | ||||
| 2019 | Lands of Lost Borders: Out of Bounds on the Silk Roads | Winner | [21] | |
| All Things Consoled: A Daughter’s Memoir | Finalist | [22] | ||
| Jan in 35 Pieces: A Memoir in Music | ||||
| Just Let Me Look at You: On Fatherhood | ||||
| Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age | ||||
| 2020 | Bush Runner | Winner | [23] | |
| Had It Coming | Finalist | |||
| Highway of Tears | ||||
| The Mosquito | ||||
| The Reality Bubble |
The RBC Taylor Emerging Writer Award was instituted for the first time in 2014. The award was presented to an emerging writer selected by the winner of that year's primary award, and consisted of $10,000 and a mentorship from the writer who made the selection.
In 2018, the RBC Taylor Foundation also announced the creation of a mentorship program for writers who had not yet published their first non-fiction manuscript. Five writers would be selected for the mentorship each year, each receiving mentorship from one of the shortlisted main prize authors.[24]