Althouse: Who gets the Nobel Prize for Literature this year?

October 9, 2018

Who gets the Nobel Prize for Literature this year?

Nobody.

64 comments:

mccullough said...: Now we know why Dylan wouldn’t accept his prize at the ceremony. Two years for rape is a short sentence.; 10/9/18, 8:17 AM
Ralph L said...: They could stop for a decade, and no one would notice.
Come to think of it, they should probably exclude anyone who hasn't been dead for 20 years, just to be sure the winner's work is worthy.; 10/9/18, 8:18 AM
Wince said...: This week, leading researchers in medicine, physics and chemistry have been awarded the prestigious Nobel Prize. And usually today we'd be telling you about the winner in literature. Except there isn't one. Not this year. The Academy is taking a year off after it was engulfed in a scandal involving sexual abuse by the husband of one of the academy members.

OH, THE HUMANITIES!; 10/9/18, 8:18 AM
Christy said...: Guess the King has no impeachment powers?

O.k. with me, the last prize winner I read was pure porn that was a chore to read. Read as though written by a female Peter Pan, determined to shock. It was merely tedious. Nobel Prize winners are no longer on my must read list.; 10/9/18, 8:20 AM
rehajm said...: I thought it was one of those Time Magazine person of the year things- 2006 winner: You; 10/9/18, 8:23 AM
Ralph L said...: Because being a member of the Swedish Academy is a lifetime appointment - you can't leave.

Not when they're paying you. And how much do they?
This sounds like a boondoggle for the Academy, the prize is secondary.; 10/9/18, 8:27 AM
Ralph L said...: He thinks the Academy might be better served with a more international jury.

Including professors at state universities in Fairfax County.; 10/9/18, 8:29 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won’t come again
And don’t speak too soon
For the wheel’s still in spin
And there’s no tellin’ who that it’s naming.’

-A former winner; 10/9/18, 8:32 AM
tcrosse said...: Better than Nobody is a very high bar.; 10/9/18, 8:32 AM
Terry di Tufo said...: I am curious if the Professor believes that Bob was smart of lucky on this one -- he treated the Nobel Committee with the (dis)respect it apparently deserved. If you gotta serve somebody, why should it be a bunch of dysfunctional corrupt Swedes? Not a group he wanted to honor.; 10/9/18, 8:42 AM
chickelit said...: The Academy plans to award two prizes next year in the hope to affect the American presidential election.; 10/9/18, 9:06 AM
I'm Full of Soup said...: What a joke our mega-establishment organizations have become.; 10/9/18, 9:12 AM
William said...: I've heard some dark rumors about how Pearl S. Buck won her award.; 10/9/18, 9:14 AM
Fernandinande said...: Aww, man, now I won't know which books I shouldn't bother to read.; 10/9/18, 9:16 AM
Bill, Republic of Texas said...: Nice tcrosse!; 10/9/18, 9:17 AM
robother said...: In retrospect, it will be obvious that the Dylan Nobel was a stop-gap measure, dealing with the reality that the cultural well spring of literature has been dried up by materialistic scientism. Without a spiritual horizon, writers are reduced to sex or violence porn. A losing proposition when you're competing for eyeballs with screens portraying the "real thing."; 10/9/18, 9:32 AM
Nonapod said...: Everybody sort of knew, but nobody wanted to admit that they knew what he was up to.

Another "open secret", just like Weinstein. Elites such a pack of amoral hypocrits.; 10/9/18, 9:42 AM
MadisonMan said...: I blame Trump.

(Obvious. Someone had to post it); 10/9/18, 9:42 AM
Chris N said...: ‘They got more prizes than poets.’

-Somebody; 10/9/18, 9:44 AM
CJinPA said...: The Nobel will be made to change, perhaps radically:

More radically, they could also insist that their shortlists have equal numbers of men and women, suggests Rice. Or the awarding bodies could, for a single year, decide to give all the prizes to women. Rice notes that this has happened in reverse dozens of times.

Nature magazine
https://tinyurl.com/y8q3oesk; 10/9/18, 9:48 AM
Birkel said...: Finally!
A winning book that I actually read.; 10/9/18, 9:56 AM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Good. It's a bullshit, showbiz award anyway, and always politicized.; 10/9/18, 9:58 AM
Anonymous said...: And the world keeps turning.; 10/9/18, 10:00 AM
Darrell said...: Hillary loses again.; 10/9/18, 10:12 AM
Clyde said...: I love Nobody's work. Couldn't put it down.; 10/9/18, 10:23 AM
Kassaar said...: They never gave it to Borges. Enough said.
The so-called Peace Prize should be replaced with a prize for mathematics, logic and computer science.; 10/9/18, 10:23 AM
Spiros Pappas said...: The Nobel Peace Prize was not awarded during WW2. The Nazis occupied Norway and members of the Nobel committee went into hiding or fled. So what's their excuse now? They're scared of fat teenage girls in pussy hats?; 10/9/18, 10:25 AM
Jaq said...: The lady who won the chemistry prize seemed kind of embarrassed since she declared her work an obvious next step in a known path.; 10/9/18, 10:25 AM
J. Farmer said...: OT:

Nikki Haley is resigning as UN ambassador. I always thought she was a terrible choice for the job, and with perhaps the sole exception of getting UN 2375 passed, her tenure was ineffectual. Though to be fair to Ambassador Haley, nearly anyone in that position will face an uphill battle in trying to implement the administration's foolish, monomaniacal obsession with isolating Iran.; 10/9/18, 10:26 AM
James K said...: Maybe they were finally going to give it to Phillip Roth, but he had the good sense to pass on.; 10/9/18, 10:28 AM
Jaq said...: Mark Twain was eligible and never won. Live that one down.; 10/9/18, 10:29 AM
MBunge said...: Is somebody, somewhere writing a paper on why so many of these sex assault/rape/harassment scandals involve those on the left/liberal side of politics and culture? I mean, there are some on the right but why aren't these stories overwhelming involving Republicans and conservatives? They're the ones who are supposed to have the retrograde views on women and their proper place in society. And the media would certainly be interested in highlighting ANY such stories. But instead of having 30 Kavanaughs for every Weinstein, it seems like the exact opposite.

Mike; 10/9/18, 10:31 AM
Jaq said...: Since the press does their job when it comes to Republicans, but not Democrats, it stands to reason that Republicans are better behaved. Plus, we cut our guilty loose.; 10/9/18, 10:36 AM
Ficta said...: Tolstoy, Twain, Joyce, Proust, Borges, Nabokov, Rilke, Musil, Zweig the list goes on and on.; 10/9/18, 10:40 AM
Bay Area Guy said...: If they can't find a worthy recipient this year, may I suggest a lifetime achievement award for PJ O'Rourke?; 10/9/18, 10:40 AM
rhhardin said...: The Man Who Never Was (1956); 10/9/18, 10:52 AM
CJinPA said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/9/18, 10:58 AM
PM said...: NYT editorial staff for Fiction.; 10/9/18, 10:59 AM
CJinPA said...: Bay Area Guy said...
"If they can't find a worthy recipient this year, may I suggest a lifetime achievement award for PJ O'Rourke?"

I loved his book "Eat the Rich." I recorded his appearance on CSPAN last week, but was disappointed. No jokes. Just an economics history lesson. I wasn't in the right frame of mind.; 10/9/18, 11:00 AM
TheGiantPeach said...: Pynchon deserves the award, but they would never give it to him, since he wouldn't show up for the award ceremony (then again, neither did Dylan).

When Sartre turned down the award, the committee was so miffed that they refused to recognize any French authors for a generation.; 10/9/18, 11:15 AM
Roughcoat said...: I nominate Cormac McCarthy.; 10/9/18, 11:22 AM
Michael McNeil said...: Nobel Prizes are never awarded posthumously; the recipient(s) must still be living at the time.; 10/9/18, 11:52 AM
Fernandinande said...: Le Zip Boner; 10/9/18, 11:58 AM
Fernandinande said...: Cormac McCarthy

I'd double-nominate Kent Haruf except he was on O'Bummer's fake reading list.

the committee was so miffed

Better to be miffed at than miffed on.; 10/9/18, 12:02 PM
Leland said...: Your nobody called today, but they hung up when I asked their name.; 10/9/18, 12:17 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Surprised they didn't go with Obama.; 10/9/18, 12:31 PM
Rabel said...: The NPR reporter, Andrew Limbong, managed to slip this quote into his report:

"And as with things like the Supreme Court and so on, there's problems with lifetime appointments in general."

But that's not important. What's important is that one member of the Swedish Academy who recently resigned is named "Lotta Lotass."

I have no further comment.; 10/9/18, 1:09 PM
Bob R said...: Don't you have a tag related to "doing nothing is a high bar?"; 10/9/18, 1:29 PM
RMc said...: The Nobel Prize: Nobody deserves it!; 10/9/18, 1:41 PM
robother said...: Speaking of Nobel Prizes, Paul Romer got one (in Economics). He mentioned that he almost didn't answer the call, since he assumed it was just another robocall. (Perhaps related to the analysis economists use in not picking up $100 bills on the sidewalk.); 10/9/18, 1:44 PM
Ann Althouse said...: I’m Nobody! Who are you?
Are you – Nobody – too?
Then there’s a pair of us!
Don’t tell! they’d advertise – you know!; 10/9/18, 1:45 PM
tcrosse said...: Nobody knows the trouble I've seen.; 10/9/18, 2:24 PM
D 2 said...: Welcome to the Nobel Academia
You can protest anytime you like but you can never Swede; 10/9/18, 3:31 PM
Jaq said...: As I was coming down the stair
I met a man who wasn't there.; 10/9/18, 4:39 PM
n.n said...: No body, no name, no viable candidates. Let's pick a color.; 10/9/18, 5:44 PM
buwaya said...: There will one day be a prize for lifetime achievement in tweeting.
Or blogging. Something like that.

When the professors start on online stuff, after they run out of anything else to write about.; 10/9/18, 7:25 PM
stephen cooper said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/9/18, 7:36 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: It should have been me, as I am doing a remarkable job, worthy of one kind of award or another. Still - big rock, floating through space - not a biggie.

I'm finding that outlook, and a lot of Habanero sauce, can make up for a lot of misfortune.; 10/9/18, 7:43 PM
stephen cooper said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/9/18, 8:08 PM
mockturtle said...: Bob Dylan is a tough act to follow. /sarc; 10/9/18, 9:37 PM
Ken B said...: Mock
That's why zo nominated Dan Brown.; 10/9/18, 10:58 PM
rcocean said...: They should have rename it the Nellie Sachs/Pearl S. Buck award for Great Woman's Literature.

Make it a female only - that should give it new life and impress people.; 10/9/18, 11:55 PM
rcocean said...: Its never been about Literary Quality. I mean Winston Churchill got it for his History of WW 2 and Russell got it for his philosophy.; 10/10/18, 12:03 AM
Baceseras said...: Russell's was for his autobiography. And Churchill's history is a considerable literary work (though giving him the Literature Prize, I presume, was done because the committee flinched at the thought that he deserved the Peace Prize for his war leadership).; 10/10/18, 2:27 AM