Founded in 1895 by the
Swedish chemist and inventor of dynamite Alfred Bernhard Nobel, the Nobel Prize
is an annual award acknowledging outstanding contributions to physics,
chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, economics, and peace. The Nobel
Laureates are announced at the beginning of October each year. A couple of
months later, on 10 December, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death, they
receive their prizes from the Swedish King – a Nobel diploma, a medal, and 10
million Swedish crowns per prize. All Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm,
Sweden, except for the Nobel Peace Prize, which is awarded in Oslo, Norway.
Swedish chemist and inventor of dynamite Alfred Bernhard Nobel, the Nobel Prize
is an annual award acknowledging outstanding contributions to physics,
chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, economics, and peace. The Nobel
Laureates are announced at the beginning of October each year. A couple of
months later, on 10 December, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death, they
receive their prizes from the Swedish King – a Nobel diploma, a medal, and 10
million Swedish crowns per prize. All Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm,
Sweden, except for the Nobel Peace Prize, which is awarded in Oslo, Norway.
Here is a list of some
eminent literary personas that were awarded and adorned this Nobel Prize for
their ornamental contribution in English Literature.
eminent literary personas that were awarded and adorned this Nobel Prize for
their ornamental contribution in English Literature.
 |
| Rudyard Kipling |
Name |
Rudyard Kipling |
Year |
1907 |
Nationality |
U.K.
Indian Born |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration that characterize the creations of this world-famous author” |
Genre |
novel, short story, poetry |
Notable Works |
The Jungle Book, Kim |
 |
| Rabindranath Tagore |
Name |
Rabindranath Tagore |
Year |
1913 |
Nationality |
Indian |
Languages |
Bengali & English |
Why rewarded? |
“because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse, by which, with consummate skill, he has made his poetic thought, expressed in his own English words, a part of the literature of the West” |
Genre |
poetry, novel, drama, short story, music |
Notable Works |
Gitanjali, Nirjharer Swapanbhanga, Gora, Naibedya etc. |
 |
| W. B. Yeats |
Name |
William Butler Yeats |
Year |
1923 |
Nationality |
Ireland |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his always inspired poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation” |
Genre |
Poetry |
Notable Works |
A Vision, The Celtic Twilight, The Tower, The Wild Swan’s at Coole, |
 |
| G. B. Shaw |
Name |
George Bernard Shaw |
Year |
1925 |
Nationality |
Ireland |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his work which is marked by both idealism and humanity, its stimulating satire often being infused with a singular poetic beauty” |
Genre |
Drama, literary criticism |
Notable Works |
Arms and the Man, Pygmalion, Man and Superman, Candida |
 |
| Sinclair Lewis |
Name |
Sinclair Lewis |
Year |
1930 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humour, new types of characters” |
Genre |
novel, short story, drama |
Notable Works |
Babbitt, It Can’t Happen Here, Free Air, The Job: An American Novel, Arrowsmith, Mantrap |
 |
| John Galsworthy |
Name | |
Year |
1932 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? | |
Genre |
Novel |
Notable Works |
The White Monkey, The Apple Tree, Silver Box, Passers By, Loyalties, Justice etc. |
 |
| Eugene O’Neill |
Name |
Eugene O’Neill |
Year |
1936 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for the power, honesty and deep-felt emotions of his dramatic works, which embody an original concept of tragedy” |
Genre |
Drama |
Notable Works |
Beyond the Horizon, Dynamo, Ah! Wilderness etc. |
 |
| P. S. Buck |
Name |
Pearl S. Buck |
Year |
1938 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for her rich and truly epic descriptions of peasant life in China and for her biographical masterpieces” |
Genre |
Novel, biography |
Notable Works |
The Good Earth, Pavilion of Women, Peony, The Big Wave, Sons, Dragon Seed etc. |
 |
| T. S. Eliot |
Name |
T.S. Eliot |
Year |
1948 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry” |
Genre |
Poetry |
Notable Works |
The Waste Land, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock |
 |
| William Faulkner |
Name |
William Faulkner |
Year |
1949 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel |
Genre |
Short story, novel |
Notable Works |
Abasalom, Abasalom!, The Sound and the Fury, As I Lay Dying etc. |
 |
| Bertrand Russell |
Name |
Bertrand Russell |
Year |
1950 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“in recognition of his varied and significant writings in which he champions humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought” |
Genre |
Philosophy, essay |
Notable Works |
Why I am not a Christian, The Problems of Philosophy, A History of Western Philosophy etc. |
 |
| Winston Churchill |
Name |
Sir Winston Churchill |
Year |
1953 |
Nationality |
United Kingdom |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values” |
Genre |
history, essay, memoirs |
Notable Works |
My Early Life, The River War, The World Crisis, Savrola etc. |
 |
| Earnest Hemingway |
Name |
Earnest Hemingway |
Year |
1954 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his mastery of the art of narrative, most recently demonstrated in The Old Man and the Sea, and for the influence that he has exerted on contemporary style” |
Genre |
Novel, short story, screen play |
Notable Works |
The Old Man and the Sea, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Sun Also Rises, To Have and Have Not etc. |
 |
| John Steinbeck |
Name |
John Steinbeck |
Year |
1962 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humour and keen social perception” |
Genre |
Novel, short story, screen play |
Notable Works |
Of Mice and Men, East of Eden, The Grapes of Wrath, The Pearl, Cannery Row etc. |
 |
| Samuel Beckett |
Name |
Samuel Becket |
Year |
1969 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English & French |
Why rewarded? |
“for his writing, which – in new forms for the novel and drama – in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation” |
Genre |
Novel, drama, poetry |
Notable Works |
Waiting for Godot, Molloy, The Unnamable, Watt etc. |
 |
| Patrick White |
Name |
Patrick White |
Year |
1973 |
Nationality |
Australia(Born in the United Kingdom) |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for an epic and psychological narrative art, which has introduced a new continent into literature” |
Genre |
Novel, short story, drama |
Notable Works |
Voss, The Tree of Man, The Eye of the Storm, The Vivisector etc. |
 |
| Saul Bellow |
Name |
Saul Bellow |
Year |
1976 |
Nationality |
United States (Born in Canada) |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for the human understanding and subtle analysis of contemporary culture that are combined in his work” |
Genre |
Short story, novel |
Notable Works |
Humboldt’s Gift, Herzog, The Adventure of Augie March, Seize the Day etc. |
Name | |
Year |
1983 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for his novels, which with the perspicuity of realistic narrative art and the diversity and universality of myth, illuminate the human condition in the world of today” |
Genre |
Novel, poetry, drama |
Notable Works |
Lord of the Flies, Free Fall, The Inheritors, The Pyramid, The Spire etc. |
 |
| Wole Soyinka |
Name |
Wole Soyinka |
Year |
1986 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“who in a wide cultural perspective and with poetic overtones fashions the drama of existence” |
Genre |
Drama, novel, poetry |
Notable Works |
The Interpreters, The Man Died: Prison Notes, Ake: The Years of Childhood etc. |
 |
| Joseph Brodsky |
Name |
Joseph Brodsky |
Year |
1987 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English & Russian |
Why rewarded? |
“for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity” |
Genre |
Poetry |
Notable Works |
Less than One, To Urania, Watermark, So Forth etc. |
 |
| Nadine Gordimer |
Name |
Nadine Gordimer |
Year |
1991 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“who through her magnificent epic writing has – in the words of Alfred Nobel – been of very great benefit to humanity” |
Genre |
Novel, short story, essay |
Notable Works |
Burger’s Daughter, Le coservateur, The Pickup, No Time Like the Present, The Lying Days etc. |
 |
| Derek Walcott |
Name |
Derek Walcott |
Year |
1992 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for a poetic oeuvre of great luminosity, sustained by a historical vision, the outcome of a multicultural commitment |
Genre |
Poetry, drama |
Notable Works |
Omeros, White Egrets, Tiepolo’s Hound etc. |
 |
| Toni Morrison |
Name |
Toni Morrison |
Year |
1993 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality |
Genre |
Novel |
Notable Works |
Beloved, The Bluest Eye, Jazz, God Helps the Child, Tar baby, A Mercy, Sula, Songs of Solomon etc. |
 |
| Seamus Heaney |
Name |
Seamus Heaney |
Year |
1995 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past” |
Genre |
Poetry |
Notable Works |
Death of Naturalist, Human Chain, North, Seeing Things etc. |
 |
| V. S. Naipaul |
Name |
V. S. Naipaul |
Year |
2001 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“for having united perceptive narrative and incorruptible scrutiny in works that compel us to see the presence of suppressed histories” |
Genre |
Novel, essay |
Notable Works |
The Mimic Man, A House for Mr. Biswas, The Enigma of Arrival, A Bend in the River, An Area of Darkness, Miguel Street, Among the Believers etc. |
 |
| J. M. Coetzee |
Name |
J. M. Coetzee |
Year |
2003 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“who in innumerable guises portrays the surprising involvement of the outsider” |
Genre |
Novel, essay, translation |
Notable Works |
Disgrace, Foe, Waiting for the Barbarians, Slow Man, Age of Iron, The Childhood of Jesus, etc. |
 |
| Harold Pinter |
Name |
Harold Pinter |
Year |
2005 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression’s closed rooms” |
Genre |
Drama |
Notable Works |
The Room, The Birthday Party, The Caretaker, The Dumb Waiter, The Dwarf etc. |
 |
| Doris Lessing |
Name |
Doris Lessing |
Year |
2007 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“that epicist of the female experience, who with scepticism, fire and visionary power has subjected a divided civilisation to scrutiny |
Genre |
novel, drama, poetry, short story, memoirs |
Notable Works |
The Golden Notebook, The Grass is Singing, The Fifth Child, Shikasta, The Good Terrorist |
 |
| Alice Munro |
Name |
Alice Munro |
Year |
2013 |
Nationality | |
Languages |
English |
Why rewarded? |
“master of the contemporary short story” |
Genre |
Short story |
Notable Works |
Dear Life, Lives of Girls and Women, Who Do You Think You Are?, Dance of the Happy Shades, Too Much Happiness etc. |
~~~~~*~~~~~
