Sunday, September 14, 2008

Nobel in Literature

For the first time I am actually looking forward to the awarding of the Nobel prize this fall. That is because I hear that Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko has been nominated. The Nobel people keep quiet on who has been nominated, but I have it on good authority that the Israeli nominator put in Yevtushenko's name. I think it is an excellent nomination and I would love to see him win it.

Looking over the list of past Nobel winners for literature, I found that most of them I have never read. Of those that I have read, I most applaud them for selecting Sigrid Undset, the Norwegian author of the Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy. She writes so well that even the portions in which she is describing the scene and the forest are gorgeous to read.

I was surprised to see Isaac Singer on the list. He is an excellent Yiddish writer, but I had only read some of his short stories. I see now that he also wrote the story Yentl, on which the movie is based. I'll have to look up some of his longer works.

Some, like Hemingway and Eliot were such obvious picks that it doesn't mean much to see them here. But what is Bertrand Russell doing on the list? I know his physics, and his cosmology and his philosophy (such as it is), but what did he do to earn a Nobel in Literature?

I am definitely surprised that Flannery O'Connor isn't on the list. What a glaring omission!

If you are bored with reading the same old trivial grocery store thrillers, the list below should offer some ideas of authors worth looking up in your library. I'm going to acquaint myself with a few of them. And for 2008 you can pencil in Yevtushenko!


2007 - Doris Lessing
2006 - Orhan Pamuk
2005 - Harold Pinter
2004 - Elfriede Jelinek
2003 - J. M. Coetzee
2002 - Imre Kertész
2001 - V. S. Naipaul
2000 - Gao Xingjian
1999 - Günter Grass
1998 - José Saramago
1997 - Dario Fo
1996 - Wislawa Szymborska
1995 - Seamus Heaney
1994 - Kenzaburo Oe
1993 - Toni Morrison
1992 - Derek Walcott
1991 - Nadine Gordimer
1990 - Octavio Paz
1989 - Camilo José Cela
1988 - Naguib Mahfouz
1987 - Joseph Brodsky
1986 - Wole Soyinka
1985 - Claude Simon
1984 - Jaroslav Seifert
1983 - William Golding
1982 - Gabriel García Márquez
1981 - Elias Canetti
1980 - Czeslaw Milosz
1979 - Odysseus Elytis
1978 - Isaac Bashevis Singer
1977 - Vicente Aleixandre
1976 - Saul Bellow
1975 - Eugenio Montale
1974 - Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson
1973 - Patrick White
1972 - Heinrich Böll
1971 - Pablo Neruda
1970 - Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
1969 - Samuel Beckett
1968 - Yasunari Kawabata
1967 - Miguel Angel Asturias
1966 - Shmuel Agnon, Nelly Sachs
1965 - Mikhail Sholokhov
1964 - Jean-Paul Sartre
1963 - Giorgos Seferis
1962 - John Steinbeck
1961 - Ivo Andric
1960 - Saint-John Perse
1959 - Salvatore Quasimodo
1958 - Boris Pasternak
1957 - Albert Camus
1956 - Juan Ramón Jiménez
1955 - Halldór Laxness
1954 - Ernest Hemingway
1953 - Winston Churchill
1952 - François Mauriac
1951 - Pär Lagerkvist
1950 - Bertrand Russell
1949 - William Faulkner
1948 - T.S. Eliot
1947 - André Gide
1946 - Hermann Hesse
1945 - Gabriela Mistral
1944 - Johannes V. Jensen
1943 - The prize money was with 1/3 allocated to the Main Fund and with 2/3 to the Special Fund of this prize section
1942 - The prize money was with 1/3 allocated to the Main Fund and with 2/3 to the Special Fund of this prize section
1941 - The prize money was with 1/3 allocated to the Main Fund and with 2/3 to the Special Fund of this prize section
1940 - The prize money was with 1/3 allocated to the Main Fund and with 2/3 to the Special Fund of this prize section
1939 - Frans Eemil Sillanpää
1938 - Pearl Buck
1937 - Roger Martin du Gard
1936 - Eugene O'Neill
1935 - The prize money was with 1/3 allocated to the Main Fund and with 2/3 to the Special Fund of this prize section
1934 - Luigi Pirandello
1933 - Ivan Bunin
1932 - John Galsworthy
1931 - Erik Axel Karlfeldt
1930 - Sinclair Lewis
1929 - Thomas Mann
1928 - Sigrid Undset
1927 - Henri Bergson
1926 - Grazia Deledda
1925 - George Bernard Shaw
1924 - Wladyslaw Reymont
1923 - William Butler Yeats
1922 - Jacinto Benavente
1921 - Anatole France
1920 - Knut Hamsun
1919 - Carl Spitteler
1918 - The prize money was allocated to the Special Fund of this prize section
1917 - Karl Gjellerup, Henrik Pontoppidan
1916 - Verner von Heidenstam
1915 - Romain Rolland
1914 - The prize money was allocated to the Special Fund of this prize section
1913 - Rabindranath Tagore
1912 - Gerhart Hauptmann
1911 - Maurice Maeterlinck
1910 - Paul Heyse
1909 - Selma Lagerlöf
1908 - Rudolf Eucken
1907 - Rudyard Kipling
1906 - Giosuè Carducci
1905 - Henryk Sienkiewicz
1904 - Frédéric Mistral, José Echegaray
1903 - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson
1902 - Theodor Mommsen
1901 - Sully Prudhomme

1 comment:

Rosa said...

Hello! I finished the painting last night, so once it is graded and I bring it home, I will post it here. =)

My blog title, "Binnorie O Binnorie," comes form a medieval ballad called "The Two Sisters." I have tried finding the meaning of the word "binnorie," but my search has not lead me to a definite answer. I think it may just be a phrase used to keep the ballad rhyming or something like that.

I see that you are a fan of Sigrid Undset. I adore her work; I first read "Kristin Lavransdatter" two years ago, and "Gunnar's Daughter" and "The Master of Hestviken" about a year ago. She was truly a genius.

Thank you for your comment, and I will try to post my painting as soon as possible!