I Didn't Win Any Pulitzer Prizes This Year

by Jesse Eisenberg

I was awarded zero Pulitzer Prizes this year. This egregious omission follows last year’s receipt of no Pulitzer Prizes, and continues my twenty-nine-year streak of not receiving even one of these prizes.

The Pulitzer Prize was created in 1917, and is awarded in twenty-one categories, none of them to me.

Overlooked in the nonfiction category was an e-mail dated January 17th, with the subject line “Re: (No Subject),” and which contained the message, “I can’t do 7:30 and Babbo is insane on Fridays. Call Carl, he knows a waiter.” This e-mail, which received no Pulitzer Prize, was sent by me, J.Eisen1983@gmail.com, to the e-mail address PeterBway@aol.com. Nicholas Lemann, of the Pulitzer committee, did not comment, “The e-mail exchange between Mr. Eisenberg and Peter Bway was informative, but its brevity is what pushed it over the edge. I hope this honor encourages Mr. Eisenberg to continue to write e-mails, either from his Gmail account or a work account yet to be created.”

The second award I lost was in the political-cartoon category. As I am apparently not known for my clever doodles on diner menus, my recent caricature, titled “Nancy Pierogi,” drawn on the corner of a Ukrainian diner menu, whimsically skewered the former Speaker for her failure to regulate the banks and also lost me a Pulitzer Prize.

In the journalism category, I did not win a Pulitzer Prize for a Sudoku puzzle I completed in the back of last Friday’s AM New York newspaper. The losing puzzle was finished on a 3 express train between Seventy-second and Forty-second Streets, an ambitious timeframe to complete such a puzzle, but one the committee presumably felt was doable.

Nor did I win a Pulitzer Prize for my intrepid reporting on the state of my piano and whether it should be placed near a window even though it might blanch the wood finish. My mother blocked my calls saying, “I just can’t keep talking about this everyday, Jesse,” but I persisted, calling from a pay phone in the middle of the night when I knew she would answer. Relentless coverage of this issue was completed in March (and the piano was moved away from the window), yet no Pulitzer Prize was granted.

The Pulitzer Prize Board also avoided awarding me anything in the category of musical composition. The committee did not issue a prize in this category last year either, and it kind of makes me feel like it’s all about who you know. And not for nothing, but I listened to the 2009 Pulitzer winner Steve Reich’s “Double Sextet” and it’s just repetitive and obvious.

In the drama category, the fit I threw in Best Buy over a dysfunctional pair of Beats By Dre headphones not only went unnoticed by the Pulitzer committee but also got me banned from the Union Square Best Buy location, which is annoying because it’s open twenty-four hours and right near my house.

Finally, I won no Pulitzer Prizes for my photography (iPhone picture of “Unknowing Girl on Subway”) or my public service (“Giving Up Seat to Elderly Woman to Look Good for Unknowing Girl on Subway”).

Says the Pulitzer-free Eisenberg of this year’s prizes: “It’s thrilling just to be considered by the Pulitzer committee. But to be ignored year after year is truly an honor I never thought I would receive.”