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Founded in 1963 as a memorial to the founder and first Chairman of the publishing firm Faber & Faber. The prize is awarded annually, alternating between recognizing a volume of verse and a volume of fiction. It is given to "that volume of verse or prose fiction first published originally in this country [the UK] during the two years preceding the year in which the award is given which is, in the opinion of the judges, of the greatest literary merit." The 1964 prize was for poetry.
The winner must be under 40 years of age and a citizen of the United Kingdom and colonies, the Commonwealth, or the Republic of Ireland or South Africa.
The three judges are reviewers nominated by editors or literary editors of newspapers and magazines which regularly review poetry and fiction. The value of the prize is £1000.
| 1964 | Christopher Middleton George MacBeth |
| 1965 | Frank Tuohy |
| 1966 | Jon Silkin |
| 1967 | William McIlvanney John Noone |
| 1968 | Seamus Heaney |
| 1969 | Piers Paul Read |
| 1970 | Geoffrey Hill |
| 1971 | J G Farrell |
| 1972 | Tony Harrison |
| 1973 | David Storey |
| 1974 | John Fuller |
| 1975 | Richard Wright |
| 1976 | Douglas Dunn |
| 1977 | Carolyn Slaughter |
| 1978 | David Harsent Kit Wright |
| 1979 | Timothy Mo |
| 1980 | Hugo Williams George Szirtes |
| 1981 | J M Coetzee |
| 1982 | Tom Paulin Paul Muldoon |
| 1983 | Graham Swift |
| 1984 | James Fenton |
| 1985 | Julian Barnes |
| 1986 | David Scott |
| 1987 | Guy Vanderhaeghe |
| 1988 | Michael Hofmann |
| 1989 | David Profumo |
| 1990 | Michael Donaghy |
| 1991 | Carol Birch |
| 1992 | Paul Muldoon |
| 1993 | Will Self |
| 1994 | John Burnside |
| 1995 | Livi Michael |
| 1996 | Kathleen Jamie |
| 1997 | Emily Perkins |
| 1998 | Don Paterson |
| 1999 | Gavin Kramer |
| 2000 | Kathleen Jamie |
| 2001 | Trezza Azzopardi |
| 2002 | Greta Stoddart |
| 2003 | Justin Hill |
| 2004 | Glyn Maxwell |
| 2005 | David Mitchell |
| 2006 | Alice Oswald |
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