2008, Blight recorded a 27-lecture course, The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845–1877 for Open Yale Courses, which is available online. Blight wrote Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, released in 2018, as the first major biography of Douglass in nearly three decades. One reviewer called it "the definitive biography of Frederick Douglass" and another heralded the book as "the new Frederick Douglass standard-bearer for years to come." It earned the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in history and the 2019 Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize. Contributing to the anthology Our American Story (2019), Blight addressed the possibility of a shared American narrative. He cited Frederick Douglass's 1867 speech titled "Composite Nation" calling for a "multi-ethnic, multi-racial 'nation' ... incorporated into this new vision of a 'composite' nationality, separating church and state, giving allegiance to a single new constitution, federalizing the Bill of Rights, and spreading liberty more broadly than any civilization had ever attempted". Blight concluded that although the search for a new unified American story would be difficult, "we must try". In July 2020, Blight was one of the 153 signers of the "Harper's Letter," published in Harper's Magazine and titled "A Letter on Justice and Open Debate"), which expressed concern that "The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted." Awards 2001 Frederick Douglass Prize for Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory. 2002 Bancroft Prize; co-winner, James A. Rawley Prize from the Organization of American Historians; 2002 Ellis W. Hawley Prize, Organization of American Historians; Merle Curti Award; and Lincoln Prize for Race and Reunion 2008 Connecticut Book Prize for A Slave No More: Two Men Who Escaped to Freedom, Including Their Own Narratives of Emancipation 2012 Anisfield-Wolf Prize for American Oracle: The Civil War in the Civil Rights Era 2018 Vincent J. Dooley Distinguished Teaching Fellow, honor bestowed by the Georgia Historical Society. 2018 The Lincoln Forum's Richard Nelson Current Award of Achievement 2019 Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize for Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom 2019 Pulitzer Prize for History for Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom 2019 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award for Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom 2020 American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal in History 2022 American Academy of Achievement’s Golden Plate Award Works Books as author Books as contributor (Contributor) "The Theft of Lincoln in Scholarship, Politics, and Public Memory," (Contributor and co-editor,