Sigrid Nunez and Anne Enright are among the winners of a $175,000 literary prize

Audio By Carbonatix

NEW YORK (AP) — National Book Award winner Sigrid Nunez and Booker Prize winner Anne Enright are among eight recipients of literary honors that include a $175,000 cash award. The Windham-Campbell Prizes are given each year for literary achievement and to enable writers to work independently.

Other winners announced Tuesday include legal scholar Patricia Williams, dramatists Roy Williams and Matilda Feyiṣayọ Ibini, poets Anthony V. Capildeo and Tongo Eisen-Martin and essayist Rana Dasgupta.

Based at Yale University, the prizes were established in 2013 by the writer Donald Windham, who drew upon family stocks inherited from his late friend Sandy Campbell. Previous winners include Percival Everett, Ling Ma and Vivian Gornick.

Windham died in 2010.

“It was the late Donald Windham’s wish in establishing these prizes to call attention to literary achievement and provide writers with time, space and freedom,” prize director Michael Kelleher said in a statement. "This mission remains at the heart of the Windham-Campbell Prizes, and in today’s world it is more vital than ever to recognize and support the crucial work and wisdom that writers share with us all.”