Alfred Nobel and the Nobel Peace Prize
In 2010, I took a Nobel Literature class and thoroughly enjoyed it. Although it was a lot of work, I read several books that probably normally would never have considered
reading including Jean Paul Sartre's
Nausea, Thomas Mann's
Magic Mountain, Gabriel Garcia
Marquez's
One Hundred Years of Solitude,and Kenzaburo Oe's
The Silent Cry. After reading these books, it made me want to read more selections from the literature prize list. Since then, I've read one or two authors from the list each year.
The history
behind the Nobel Prize for literature is quite interesting and well worth perusing when you have the
time. Alfred
Nobel was Swedish and when he died, he requested the bulk of his
fortune be used to establish a prize which would be divided in 5 equal
parts.
"The
whole of my remaining realizable estate shall be dealt with in the
following way: the capital, invested in safe securities by my
executors, shall constitute a fund, the interest on which shall be
annually distributed in the form of prizes to those who, during the
preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind.
The said interest shall be divided into five equal parts, which shall
be apportioned as follows:
one part to the person who shall have made the most important discovery or invention within the field of physics;
one part to the person who shall have made the most important chemical discovery or improvement;
one part to the person who shall have made the most important discovery within the domain of physiology or medicine;
one part to the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction;
and
one part to the person who shall have done the most or the best work
for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of
standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.
The
prizes for physics and chemistry shall be awarded by the Swedish
Academy of Sciences; that for physiology or medical works by the
Karolinska Institute in Stockholm; that for literature by the Academy
in Stockholm, and that for champions of peace by a committee of five
persons to be elected by the Norwegian Storting. It is my express wish
that in awarding the prizes no consideration be given to the
nationality of the candidates, but that the most worthy shall receive
the prize, whether he be Scandinavian or not."
He
also specified who would be responsible for selecting the noble
laureates and for literature, the responsibility was given to the
Swedish Academy.
A big question has always been how do you get nominated. Well, an
author cannot nominate himself. He must be nominated by what the
Academy considers a qualified person. Who is qualified?
- members of the Swedish Academy and of other academies, institutions and societies similar to it in membership and aims;
- professors of literary and linguistic disciplines at universities and university colleges;
- former Nobel Laureates in Literature;
- presidents of authors’ organisations which are representative of the literary activities of their respective countries.
Then
the academy gleans through the candidates, eventually narrows down the
nominations to a select few, reads their works and decides whom will win
the prize. The members of the Academy don't always agree and it seems
there have been some controversial and what some consider politically
motivated awards handed out to writers. Plus there has been controversy
regarding some of the authors who haven't won, whom some considered
better qualified. And then you have some authors who didn't want to
accept the prize because they considered it the death of their career.
And
you have a group of 18 people who are interpreting Nobel's words "the
person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most
outstanding work in an
ideal direction." It depends entirely on their definition of ideal. The
members of the academy are a diverse group of linguists, literary scholars and historians.
My
main thought while reading all this was where did the money come from.
Was Alfred Nobel independently wealthy, did he inherit the money
himself, where did all this money come from that is being used to fund
the prize? Long story short, in 1867 he invented
Dynamite.
He had factories and laboratories in over 90 places in 20 different
countries. He had initially created dynamite to be used for mining and
because it ended up being used for purposes he never intended, he
created the Nobel Prize.
The Nobel Prize Winners in Literature
Which Nobel prize winners have you read?
If you haven't yet, that's okay. I'll be adding
Nobel Prize for Literature as one of the main mini challenges for 2014.
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