It's that time again. Each July when we converge on the Comic-Con International in San Diego, we present the Bill Finger Award for Excellence in Comic Book Writing. Actually, we present two of them — one to a deceased writer of the past and one to someone who's still with us. Ideally, the person who's still with us will be with us at Comic-Con to receive it in person. So here I am again to solicit nominations of who you think should get 'em this year. If you have a name to suggest, please send it to me. But do remember the following…
- This is an award for a body of work as a comic book writer. Every year, a couple of folks nominate their favorite artist. Sometimes, they don't get that "writer" part and sometimes, they argue that their guy wrote two issues of something in 1968. No, no, no. A body of work as a comic book writer. Why is that so difficult to understand?
- Bill Finger in his lifetime received almost no credit for his work and nowhere near a respectable share of the revenue it generated. So this award is for a writer who has received insufficient reward for his or her splendid body of work. It can be insufficient in terms of recognition or insufficient in terms of legal tender or it can, of course, be both.
- This is for writing in comic books. Not strips. Comic books. We stretch that definition far enough to include MAD but that's as far as we'll stretch it.
- A person can only win this award once. So far, it has gone to Arnold Drake, Alvin Schwartz, George Gladir, Larry Lieber, Frank Jacobs, Gary Friedrich, Del Connell, Steve Skeates, Don Rosa, Jerry Siegel, Harvey Kurtzman, Gardner Fox, Archie Goodwin, John Broome, Otto Binder, Bob Haney, Frank Doyle and Steve Gerber. Those folks are therefore ineligible.
Got a name to suggest? My address is on this page. Any reasonable nomination will be placed before our Blue Ribbon Judging Committee for consideration. Thank you.