NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE AND TRANSLATIONS: SOME INTERESTING FACTS
The Nobel Prize, bestowed by the Swedish Academy and widely acclaimed as one of the most significant awards in the world, opens the door to the dissemination and translation of Nobel literature laureates.
The Nobel Prize in Literature was established by the last will and testament of Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel in 1895 and has been awarded annually —with a few exceptions— since 1901 by the Swedish Academy.
Undoubtedly, it is one of the most important recognitions in the field of literature. A new laureate is announced every year. The 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the Norwegian author Jon Fosse.
Consequently, the announcement of this prestigious award usually triggers publishers’ interest in the works of Nobel Prize authors worldwide. In this article, we share some interesting facts about the Nobel Prize in Literature and its connection with translation.
Nobel Prize in Literature: Tidbits
During his youth, Alfred Nobel developed an interest in literature, which lasted throughout his life. His library comprised a rich and broad selection of literature in different languages. For this reason, literature was the fourth category of awards mentioned by Nobel in his will.
Since 1901, the Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded 116 times. This recognition was not awarded on seven occasions: 1914, 1918, 1935, 1940, 1941, 1942, and 1943 due to World War I and II.
Only on four occasions was the Nobel Prize in Literature shared by two authors: in 1904, Frédéric Mistral - José Echegaray; in 1917: Karl Gjellerup - Henrik Pontoppidan; in 1966: Shmuel Agnon - Nelly Sachs, and in 1974: Eyvind Johnson - Harry Martinson.
Another interesting fact is that, so far, the youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize was Rudyard Kipling, author of The Jungle Book, who was 41 years old when he received the award in 1907. Conversely, the oldest recipient was British author Doris Lessing, who had turned 88 at the time of her award in 2007.
The 1931 Nobel Prize in Literature was posthumously awarded to the Swedish poet Erik Axel Karlfeldt. Since 1974, however, the Statutes of the Nobel Foundation have established that a prize cannot be awarded posthumously unless the recipient's death occurred after the announcement of the prize.
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Nobel Prize in Literature: 17 Female Laureates
Only 17 women authors have won the Nobel Prize since 1901. Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf (1858-1940) was the first female writer to receive the Nobel Prize in 1909, five years before becoming the first woman to be elected a member of the Swedish Academy.
Five of the Nobel Literature Prizes over the last ten years have been awarded to women: in 2013 – Alice Munro; in 2015 – Svetlana Alexievich; in 2018 – Olga Tokarczuk; 2020 – Louise Glück and in 2022 – Annie Ernau. The choice has been influenced by the feminist movements at the turn of the 19th century, which promoted gender equality, inclusion, and women’s empowerment, among other issues.
Nobel Prize and Translation
While there is no single reliable source to determine which literature award laureates had their work most translated, we can mention some authors whose popularity has gone beyond the Nobel Prize.
For example, according to the Instituto Cervantes’s World Map of Translation (Mapa Mundial de la Traducción), renowned Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez, Nobel Prize winner in 1982, leads the list of the most translated Spanish-speaking authors in the 21st century so far. His acclaimed novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude, was published in more than 49 languages and sold over 30 million copies.
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Another Nobel laureate included among the most translated authors is Chilean writer Pablo Neruda, who received the Nobel Prize in 1971. Recognized as one of the most important Latin American poets of the 20th century, Neruda’s works have been translated into more than 35 languages, according to Fundación Pablo Neruda’s website.
In the same geographical region, Mario Vargas Llosa—2010 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature—is the most translated Peruvian author for this second novel, The Green House, which has been translated into more than 19 languages.
Included in the long list of authors who have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature are three writers most widely read worldwide; this may be the reason why their works are among the most widely translated as well: Ernest Hemingway (United States of America), known for novels such as The Old Man and the Sea and For Whom the Bell Tolls; Albert Camus (France), whose philosophical and literary works The Stranger and The Plague are still widely read and studied, and William Faulkner (United States of America), recognized for his novels set in the US South, such as As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury.
