Hugo Award for Best Professional Editor

The Hugo Award for Best Professional Editor is one of the Hugo Awards given each year for science fiction or fantasy stories published or translated into English during the previous calendar year. The award is available for editors of magazines, novels, anthologies, or other works related to science fiction or fantasy. The award supplanted a previous award for professional magazine. The Hugo Awards have been described as "a fine showcase for speculative fiction" and "the best known literary award for science fiction writing".^[1][2]

The award was first presented in 1973, and was given annually through 2006. Beginning in 2007, the award was split into two categories, that of Best Editor (Short Form) and Best Editor (Long Form). The Short Form award is for editors of anthologies, collections or magazines, while the Long Form award is for editors of novels. In addition to the regular Hugo awards, beginning in 1996 Retrospective Hugo Awards, or "Retro Hugos", have been available to be awarded for years 50, 75, or 100 years prior in which no awards were given.^[3] To date, Retro Hugo awards have been awarded for 1939, 1941, 1943–1946, 1951, and 1954, and in each case an award for professional editor was given.^[4]

During the 60 nomination years, 92 editors have been nominated for the original Best Professional Editor, the Short Form, or the Long Form award, including Retro Hugos. Of these, Gardner Dozois has received the most awards, with 15 original awards out of 19 nominations for the original category and 1 out of 2 for the Short Form. The only other editors to win more than three awards are Ellen Datlow, who won 9 of 18 nominations, split between the original and short form awards, Ben Bova, who won 6 of 8 nominations for the original award, and John W. Campbell Jr. with 8 out of 8 nominations for the Retro Hugo awards. The three editors who have won three times are Edward L. Ferman with 3 out of 20 original nominations, Neil Clarke with 3 out of 12 Short Form nominations, and Patrick Nielsen Hayden with 3 out of 4 Long Form nominations. Stanley Schmidt has received the most nominations, at 27 original and 7 Short Form, winning one Short Form.