By Jørgen Sneis
Pretend for a moment that there had never been such a thing as the Nobel Prize in Literature. Now imagine coming across a list of all Nobel laureates, consisting of nothing but their names. What would you make of that list? What could these individuals possibly have in common? It might just occur to you as a game of Odd One Out. It’s a list of authors, sure, some of them well known to us, some of them not. But what about such names as Bob Dylan, Winston Churchill, Bertrand Russell, Theodor Mommsen?
After more than 120 years of awards, it’s hard to imagine a world without the Nobel. The question remains, though. Are the laureates mentioned above just examples of “apples winning prizes for orangeness”?[1] Following the 2016 announcement, the novelist Jodi Picoult wrote on Twitter: “I’m happy for Bob Dylan. #ButDoesThisMeanICanWinAGrammy?”[2] This neatly sums up much of the discussion surrounding Dylan’s award. However, looking at the history of the prize, it is also worth noting that the Swedish Academy has in fact been highly reflective about its apples and oranges.