Each winner of the 1982 Governor General's Awards for Literary Merit was selected by a panel of judges administered by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Category	Winner	Nominated
Fiction	Guy Vanderhaeghe, Man Descending[1]	Alice Munro, The Moons of Jupiter Chris Scott, Antichthon
Non-fiction	Christopher Moore, Louisbourg Portraits: Life in an Eighteenth-Century Garrison Town[1]	Northrop Frye, The Great Code: The Bible and Literature Christina McCall-Newman, Grits: An Intimate Portrait of The Liberal Party
Poetry	Phyllis Webb, The Vision Tree: Selected Poems[1]	Robert Bringhurst, The Beauty of the Weapons: Selected Poems 1972-1982 Barry Dempster, Fables for Isolated Men Diane Keating, No Birds or Flowers
Drama	John Gray, Billy Bishop Goes to War[1]	Lawrence Jeffery, Clay Betty Lambert, Jennie's Story

Category	Winner	Nominated
Fiction	Roger Fournier, Le cercle des arènes[1]	Gaëtan Brulotte, Le surveillant Louis Caron, Les fils de la liberté II: La corne de brume Anne Hébert, Les fous de Bassan
Non-fiction	Maurice Lagueux, Le marxisme des années soixante: une saison dans l'histoire de la pensée critique[1]	Flore Dupriez, La condition féminine et les Pères de l'Église latine
Poetry	Michel Savard, Forages[1]	Alphonse Piché, Dernier profil
Drama	Réjean Ducharme, Ha ha! ...[1]	Marie Laberge, Avec l'hiver qui s'en vient Léo Lévesque, ... Quand j'y ai dit ça ... à parti à rire Jovette Marchessault, La terre est trop courte, Violette Leduc