The Hooshang Golshiri Award
Modern Contemporary Iranian literature, especially fiction, has been mostly in official disfavor for about 2 decades. The exclusion of modern works of fiction from the annual list of "The Best Books of the Year" selected by the Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance every year reflects this fact.
Hooshang Golshiri, one of the most distinguished pioneers of Iranian modern fiction, who was always deeply concerned for the promotion of modern literature, decided to set up an independent jury to reward the best works of fiction every year; this plan could not be realized because of his deteriorating health and sudden death.
The Hooshang Golshiri foundation was initially established in order to realize his wish and commend what is deemed to be the best fiction written in each particular year.

The foundation gives awards in his name for the four best works of fiction every year. The categories include:

The Best Novel The Best Collection of Short Stories The Best First Novel The Best First Collection of Short Stories

The last two categories show the foundation's commitment to its basic principles, that is awarding writers whose works have been published for the very first time alongside of well-established authors.
The Awards - prize money (10 million Rials for the first 2 and 5 million Rials for the last 2 categories), a trophy and letter of appreciation - are presented to the winners in a ceremony held annually, in autumn.

The best individual short stories of the year, selected by the jury, are published each year by the foundation in a volume entitled "Naqsh" [Imprint].

The books eligible for this competition are novels and collections of short stories published in Farsi in Iran for the first time in that particular year.

The inclusion of Iranian authors living outside Iran, who publish in this country, is a further reflection of the pluralism that characterizes this award; the foundation deems it a welcome opportunity to acknowledge and appreciate the diversity of language, style, and attitude among all Iranian writers living in widely different societies all over the world.