1949 Nobel Prize in Literature

20px 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature William Faulkner Swedish Academy 1901 https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1949/summary/ 1949 laureate Carl Van Vechten - William Faulkner (greyscale and cropped).jpg "for his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel." 3 November 1949notes The Swedish Academy decided on 3rd November 1949 that this year's Nobel Prize in Literature would be reserved for the following year.http://libris.kb.se/bib/8345517 Nobelpriset i litteratur. Nomineringar och utlåtanden 1901–1950 Bo Svensén 2001 Svenska Akademien 9789113010076 1 November 2025 (postponement) 10 November 1950 (announcement) 10 December 1950 (ceremony) Stockholm, Sweden 1948 Nobel Prize in Literature 1950 The 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the American novelist and short story writer William Faulkner (1897–1962) "for his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel."https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1949/summary/ Nobel Prize in Literature 1949 nobelprize.org The prize was awarded the following year in October 1950. The Nobel Committee for Literature had decided that none of the nominations for 1949 met the criteria as outlined in the will of Alfred Nobel, and the prize was reserved until the following year. Laureate William Faulkner William Faulkner generally is regarded as one of the most significant American writers of all time. Faulkner wrote 13 novels and many short stories but started as a poet. With his breakthrough novel, The Sound and the Fury (1929), he began to use stream of consciousness to portray a character's flow of inner thoughts. His books often are told from the point of view of several characters and contain accurately rendered colloquialisms combined with long sentences full of imagery and language that is sometimes surreal. Among his other famous works include As I Lay Dying (1930), Light In August (1934) and Absalom! Absalom! (1936).https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Faulkner William Faulkner 2 July 2023 BritannicaWilliam Faulkner – Facts nobelprize.org Deliberations Nominations William Faulkner was not nominated for the prize in 1949,https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/list.php?prize=4&year=1949 Nominations 1949 April 2020 nobelprize.org but he was nominated the following year and in 1950 the Swedish Academy decided to award Faulkner the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1949. Faulkner was nominated by Prince Wilhelm, Duke of Södermanland who became the president of the Swedish PEN Centre. Faulkner had not been nominated for the prize before, making it a rare occasion when an author have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature the same year they were first nominated.https://www.svenskaakademien.se/nobelpriset/nomineringar-och-utlatanden-1901-1950 Nomineringar och utlåtanden 1901-1950 Svenska Akademien Swedish In total, the Nobel Committee received 43 nominations for authors such as Benedetto Croce, Thornton Wilder, Winston Churchill (awarded in 1953), François Mauriac (awarded in 1952), Carl Sandburg, Georges Duhamel, and Pär Lagerkvist (awarded in 1951). 9 of the nominees were nominated first-time among them Albert Camus (awarded in 1957), Leonid Leonov, Enrique González Martínez, Alfonso Reyes, Taha Hussein, and Alberto Moravia. Three of the nominees were women: Marie Under, Henriette Charasson, and Dorothy Canfield Fisher. The authors James Truslow Adams, Hervey Allen, Chairil Anwar, Rex Beach, Elsa Bernstein, Maurice Blondel, Jacques Copeau, Will Cuppy, Lucien Descaves, Ali Douagi, William Price Drury, Inés Echeverría Bello, Herbert Eulenberg, Martin Grabmann, Yaroslav Halan, Edmond Jaloux, Klaus Mann, Sarojini Naidu, Elin Pelin, Gustav Radbruch, Alexander Serafimovich, George Shiels, Elin Wägner, and Oton Župančič died in 1949 without having been nominated for the prize. Official list of nominees and their nominators for the prize No. Nominee Country Genre(s) Nominator(s)1Shmuel Yosef Agnon (1887–1970)Israelnovel, short storyHugo Bergmann (1883–1975)2Mark Aldanov (1886–1957)Soviet Union(Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic Ukraine)French Fourth Republic Francebiography, novel, essays, literary criticism20px Ivan Bunin (1870–1953)3Riccardo Bacchelli (1891–1985)Italynovel, drama, essays20px Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888–1965) Accademia dei Lincei4Eugène Baie (1874–1964)Belgiumlaw, essays20px Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949)5Albert Camus (1913–1960)French Fourth Republic Francenovel, short story, essays, philosophy, dramaHjalmar Gullberg (1898–1961)6Dorothy Canfield Fisher (1879–1958)United States 1912novel, short story, pedagogy, essaysDavid Baumgardt (1890–1963)7Hans Carossa (1878–1956)Allied-occupied Germany Germanypoetry, autobiography, essaysHenry Olsson (1896–1985)8Henriette Charasson (1884–1972)French Fourth Republic Francepoetry, essays, drama, novel, literary criticism, biographySerge Barrault (1887–1976)9Winston Churchill (1874–1965)United Kingdomhistory, essays, memoirNils Ahnlund (1889–1957) Birger Nerman (1888–1971)10Benedetto Croce (1866–1952)Italyhistory, philosophy, lawFritz Strich (1882–1963) Accademia dei Lincei11Georges Duhamel (1884–1966)French Fourth Republic Francenovel, short story, poetry, drama, literary criticismMartin Lamm (1880–1950) Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953)12Johan Falkberget (1879–1967)Norwaynovel, short story, essaysRichard Beck (1897–1980) Andreas Hofgaard Winsnes (1889–1972)13Enrique González Martínez (1871–1952)MexicopoetryAntonio Castro Leal (1896–1981)14Jacinto Grau Delgado (1877–1958)Francoist Spain Spaindrama, essays, short story, literary criticismHjalmar Gullberg (1898–1961)15Taha Hussein (1889–1973)Kingdom of Egypt Egyptnovel, short story, poetry, translationAhmed Lutfi el-Sayed (1872–1963)notes Several other members of the King Fuad I University also nominated Taha Hussein.16Pär Lagerkvist (1891–1974)Swedenpoetry, novel, short story, dramaErik Ekelund (1897–1976)17Halldór Laxness (1902–1998)Icelandnovel, short story, drama, poetryJón Helgason (1899–1986)18Leonid Leonov (1899–1994)Soviet Uniondrama, novel, short storyValentin Kiparsky (1904–1983)19André Malraux (1901–1976)French Fourth Republic Francenovel, essays, literary criticismMartin Lamm (1880–1950)20François Mauriac (1885–1970)French Fourth Republic Francenovel, short storyHenri Peyre (1901–1988) Gustaf Hellström (1882–1953)21Ramón Menéndez Pidal (1869–1968)Francoist Spain Spainphilology, history Gunnar Tilander (1894–1973)22Alberto Moravia (1907–1990)Italynovel, literary criticism, essays, dramaHjalmar Gullberg (1898–1961)23Charles Langbridge Morgan (1894–1958)United Kingdomdrama, novel, essays, poetryElias Wessén (1889–1981)24Seán O'Casey (1880–1964)Irelanddrama, memoirOscar Wieselgren (1886–1971)25Arnulf Øverland (1889–1968)Norwaypoetry, essaysMartin Lamm (1880–1950) Lorentz Eckhoff (1884–1974) Harry Fett (1875–1962)26Boris Pasternak (1890–1960)Soviet Unionpoetry, novel, translationMaurice Bowra (1898–1971)27Alfonso Reyes Ochoa (1889–1959)Mexicophilosophy, essays, novel, poetry20px Gabriela Mistral (1889–1957)notes Other nominations were made of Alfonso Reyes.28Carl Sandburg (1878–1967)United States 1912poetry, essays, biographyEinar Tegen (1884–1965)29George Santayana (1863–1952)Francoist Spain SpainUnited States 1912philosophy, essays, poetry, novelGiuseppe Antonio Borgese (1882–1952)30Mikhail Sholokhov (1905–1984)Soviet UnionnovelValentin Kiparsky (1904–1983)31Angelos Sikelianos (1884–1951)Kingdom of Greece Greecepoetry, dramaSigfrid Siwertz (1882–1970)32John Steinbeck (1902–1968)United States 1912novel, short story, screenplayHenri Peyre (1901–1988)33Reinaldo Temprano Azcona (1911–1954)Francoist Spain SpainessaysEmilio Alarcos García (1895–1986)34Marie Under (1883–1980)Soviet Union(Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic Estonia)poetryHjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953)35Thornton Wilder (1897–1975)United States 1912drama, novel, short storyYngve Brilioth (1891–1959) Prize decision 1950 Nobel Prize in Literature#Prize decision On 3 November 1949 the Swedish Academy announced that no Nobel Prize in Literature would be awarded that year: "No Nobel Prize in Literature will be awarded this year. And the justification, in short, is that none of this year's candidates has been able to gather the absolute majority required according to the statutes for the prize to be awarded. For the time being, two literature prizes are therefore at the Academy's disposal next year. In 1918 and 1935 the same measure was taken on the same grounds."https://sverigesradio.se/artikel/6199524 Avgörande ögonblick: När tvivlet kom till Akademien 29 June 2015 Sveriges Radio Swedish Berg Mattias Considered candidates for the 1949 prize included the French novelist Georges Duhamel and the Greek writer Angelos Sikelianos, but none of them received any strong support from the members of the Nobel committee. The German writer Hans Carossa were also mentioned as a possible candidate. The 83 year old Italian philosopher Benedetto Croce's candidacy was dismissed because of his advanced age, while the 35 year old Albert Camus were thought too young to be considered a candidate for the 1949 prize. Pär Lagerkvist who had some support in Nobel committee and eventually was awarded the 1951 Nobel Prize in Literature had in 1949 declined to be considered for the prize.Det litterära Nobelpriset : historien om världslitteraturens största utmärkelse Kampen om modernismen Tenngart, Paul Albert Bonniers förlag 2025 Swedish The Academy awarded the prize for 1949 the following year to William Faulkner, while Bertrand Russell was awarded the 1950 Nobel Prize in Literature.The Nobel Prize in Literature: Nominations and Reports 1901–1950 nobelprize.org Faulkner's candidacy for the prize was launched by Academy member Gustaf Hellström who in a report praised Faulkner's "narrative genius" and called him "for the time being, one of the fore-most figures not only in the American novel but in English fiction in general". Nobel committee chairman Anders Österling had doubts that Faulkner's "deeply depressing themes" met “the demand of a consolatory or in some way positive view of life which was in all likelihood intended in the [by donor Alfred Nobel] guidelines of an idealistic direction", but concluded that "his artistic integrity is so strong and original that one finally hesitates to apply such a measurement to his novels". Faulkner's candidacy was not fully supported by the 1950 Nobel committee, but won the majority of the votes from the members of the Swedish Academy and Faulkner was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1949.The Nobel Prize in Literature - a New Century Espmark, Kjell Svenska Akademien 2021 50 Award ceremony speech In his award ceremony speech on 10 December 1950, Gustaf Hellström, member of the Swedish Academy, said of Faulkner: As a probing psychologist he is the unrivalled master among all living British and American novelists. Neither do any of his colleagues possess his fantastic imaginative powers and his ability to create characters. His subhuman and superhuman figures, tragic or comic in a macabre way, emerge from his mind with a reality that few existing people – even those nearest to us – can give us [...] Moreover – side by side with Joyce and perhaps even more so – Faulkner is the great experimentalist among twentieth-century novelists. Scarcely two of his novels are similar technically. It seems as if by this continuous renewal he wanted to achieve the increased breadth which his limited world, both in geography and in subject matter, cannot give him. The same desire to experiment is shown in his mastery, unrivalled among modern British and American novelists, of the richness of the English language, a richness derived from its different linguistic elements and the periodic changes in style – from the spirit of the Elizabethans down to the scanty but expressive vocabulary of the Negroes of the southern states.https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1949/ceremony-speech/ Award Ceremony speech nobelprize.org Acceptance speech At the banquet, Faulkner read his acceptance speech, which he ended with an affirmation of faith: I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The speech was later made available in print.A. Nicholas Fargnoli, Michael Golay Critical Companion to William Faulkner, Infobase Publishing 2009, p.422 Reactions The choice of William Faulkner as the Nobel Prize Laureate was well received.https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/ref/books/nobel-prize-literature.html?8dpc Winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature (link to article) The New York Times Faulkner himself at first refused to travel to Sweden to accept the award, but was persuaded by friends and his wife to travel. At the banquet in Stockholm on 10 December 1950 he held a memorable acceptance speech. Faulkner eventually gave away the prize money in scholarships and other bequests. Notes References External links Award Ceremony speech nobelprize.org Faulkner's Banquet speech nobelprize.org The Nobel Prize Award Ceremony 1950 video nobelprize.org 1949 Category:William Faulkner Nobel