The Nobel Prize in Literature
Established in the will of Swedish dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel, the Nobel Prizes have been awarded since 1901 for achievements in literature, science, and peace.
Past literature laureates, awarded 11 million Swedish kronor (about $1.2 million), include the French poet and essayist Sully Prudhomme, the first recipient; American novelist William Faulkner (1949); British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (1953); Turkish author Orhan Pamuk (2006); and Norwegian writer Jon Fosse (2023).
Five Poles have received the Nobel Prize in Literature: Henryk Sienkiewicz (1905), Władysław Reymont (1924), Czesław Miłosz (1980), Wisława Szymborska (1996), and Olga Tokarczuk (2018).
Last year, the South Korean writer Han Kang received the prize, becoming the eighteenth woman in history to be awarded and the first Korean Nobel laureate in literature.
Over the years, decisions by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences have sparked both admiration and controversy, Reuters notes.
In 2016, the award to American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan drew criticism, with some arguing that his work “was not true literature.” Controversy also surrounded the 2019 award to Austrian writer Peter Handke, who attended the funeral of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević in 2006, a figure blamed for thousands of deaths in Kosovo and the displacement of nearly a million people during the 1998–1999 war.
In the past, critics have accused the Academy of snobbery, anti-American bias, and overlooking literary giants such as Leo Tolstoy, Émile Zola, and James Joyce.
