It's that time again...

                   
                   
                

The name has been revealed.

In amongst all the political upheaval over the EU getting the Nobel Peace Prize, the recipient for literature has been rather overlooked. Not that Mo Yan is a household name...yet. The first Chinese citizen to receive the award in its 111 year history, Yan is very much a product of the education of life having left school at 12 to work in the fields and subsequently serve in the army.

Indeed, praised for merging 'folk tales, history and the contemporary' with 'hallucinatory realism', Yan's best known books Jiuguo (The Republic of Wine), Shengsi pilao (Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out) and Tanxiangxing(Sandalwood Death) are embedded in culture and experience.

It is still in this humble attitude that the 'overjoyed and scared' author will receive his Nobel Prize for Literature in a lavish awards ceremony on December 10th.

The Class of 1386...

On this day...The University of Heidelburg was officially opened in 1386. The oldest univeristy in Germany, and only the third established in the Holy Roman Empire, Heidelburg has many things to boast of. Not least is its alumni, whose numbers include 30 Nobel Laureates, German Chancellors, and even a Pope. However, for those of a literary persuasion, there are also several notable associations. Perhaps the most decorated is Nobel Laureate Carl Spittler who was rewarded 'in special appreciation of his epic, "Olympian Spring"'.

Yet despite his success amongst critics and academics, Spittler is by no means the best known inhabitant of the medieval walls. Mark Twain, who visited the univeristy as part of his European tour in 1878, detailed his impression in the travelogue 'A Tramp Abroad', humorously depicting a student body of aristocratic dandies. Such was the popularity of the American writer, that a US Army base in the city now bears his name. The university also plays fictional host to W. Somerset Maugham's Philip Carey in his novel 'Of Human Bondage' and, perhaps more famously, appears on screen in the Oscar winning adaptation of Bernard Schlink's 'The Reader'.

The Philanderer...

On this day...German writer Paul Johann Ludwig von Heyse was born in 1830. The son of Felix Mendelssohn's tutor, and a Prussian court jeweller descendant, Heyse was born into a family already heavily connected with the artistic world. Thus he soon befriended names such as Theodor Fontane and Emanuel Geibel, joining the literary group Tunnel über der Spree, before publishing his first poem, 'Frühlingsanfang', in 1848. Although settled on becoming a writer, Heyse's hopes were initially short-lived, as he was discovered to have been conducting an affair with the wife of a university professor and was sent back to Berlin in disgrace.

Yet it was in Munich that his literary revival was secured. Granted an audience with the King of Bavaria, Heyse presented his verse tales, 'Hemen', and preceeded to become known as one of the Nordlichten, establishing his own literary society, Die Krokodile. He continued to write prolifically and his work was recognised in 1910, when he received the Nobel Prize for Literature as 'a tribute to the consummate artistry, permeated with idealism, which he has demonstrated during his long productive career as a lyric poet, dramatist, novelist and writer of world-renowned short stories'. Hysee died in 1914, at the age of 84.

The Leftie...

On this day...Socialist playwright George Bernard Shaw refused to accept the monetary award for his Nobel Prize in 1925. The only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize and an Oscar, Shaw was nominated for 'his work which is marked by both idealism and humanity, its stimulating satire often being infused with a singular poetic beauty'.

In accordance with his leftist ideologies, Shaw had no desire for public honours, and wanted to refuse the Prize outright. At the behest of his wife however, who considered it to be a tribute to Ireland, he reluctantly accepted it, yet still eschewed the 800,000 Swedish Kroner or there abouts. In announcing his decision Shaw said, 'I can forgive Alfred Nobel for inventing dynamite, but only a fiend in human form could have invented the Nobel Prize'.

On this day...

French writer and philosopher Jean Paul Sartre won and declined the Nobel Prize for Literature, in 1964. The first Nobel Laureate to voluntarily decline the prize, Sartre had a history for refusing awards, having previously turned down the Legion d'honneur in 1945. As it turned out, the embarassment to the the Swedish Academy could have been avoided, as it later transpired Sartre had written to them two weeks previously asking to be removed from the list of nominees.

However, this went unheeded, and so, on the 23rd of October, 'Le Figaro' published a statement by Sartre explaining the reasoning behind his refusal. His primary objection, was that he did not wish to be seen to be taking sides in an East vs. West cultural struggle by accepting an award from a prominent Western cultural institution. Sartre subsequently hid in a friend's house in a bid to escape the media attention.

Nobel Prize 2010...

Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa, has been awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature. The first South American winner of the prize since 1982, Vargas Llosa first thought the announcement was a joke. His career has not been easy, but following book burnings and a bitter personal feud with a fellow writer, Vargas Llosa has published 30 plays, novels and essays, translated into 31 languages - the best known of which include, 'The Time of he Hero', and 'The Green House'. Hailed for his 'cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual's resistance, revolt, and defeat', Vargas Llosa will receive a 10 million kroner reward.

On this day...

Polish-born American author Isaac Bashevis Singer, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1978. A Jewish writer, Singer wrote the majority of his works in Yiddish, even delivering the first part of his Nobel Prize speech in his favoured language.

Singer had suffered tragedy during the war, losing both his mother and brother to the Nazis; an experience which was expressed clearly in his writings, as the Swedish Academy recognised him for 'his impassioned narrative art which, with roots in a Polish-Jewish cultural tradition, brings universal human conditions to life'. His best known works include, 'The Family Moskat', 'The Manor' and 'The Estate'.

On this day...

American author William Faulkner died in 1962, at the age of 64. Born and raised in Mississippi, the state, and its Southern racial history, heavily influenced his later writings. However, literature was not his first port of call when beginning his career, and indeed it was the army that first attracted his attention. Yet even in an era beset by so many conflicts, Faulkner was rejected for his height, being only 5'5½", and instead joined the British Royal Flying Corps, though he did not see any action in World War One. It was on such a military theme that Faulkner wrote his first novel, 'Soldiers' Pay' in 1926 - the house that in which it was written, 624 Pirate Alley, being now the premises of Faulkner House Books.

Over the next few years, Faulkner produced a steady stream of works, including 'The Sound and the Fury', 'As I Lay Dying' and 'Absalom, Absalom!', and yet his big break conceivably came after all these had been published. In the early 1940s, at the invitation of Howard Hawks, Faulkner journeyed to Hollywood in search of money, and contributed to both Raymond Chandler's 'The Big Sleep' and Ernest Hemingway's 'To Have and Have Not' among others. Although his personal life remained volatile, including numerous extramarital affairs and a heavy drinking problem, Faulkner was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1949, for 'his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel'.

Saramago's final page...

Nobel Laureate Jose Saramago died yesterday at the age of 87. The Portuguese author, 'known almost as much for his unfaltering Communism as for his fiction', moved to Lanzarote in the early 1990s following a clash with the right-wing government of the day, and it was there that he died having published last novel 'Cain', at the end of 2009. Famous for his unorthodox use of syntax, Saramago's best-known novel is 'Blindness', in which the entire population lose their sight. Citing him as an author who 'with parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony continually enables us once again to apprehend an elusory reality', Saramgo was honoured with the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1998.

On this day...

Irish poet Seamus Heaney was born in 1939. Born himself in Northern Ireland, Heaney believes his background to contain significant tension, containg both the Ireland of the cattle-herding Gaelic past and the Ulster of the Industrial Revolution. It was whilst studying English language and literature at university, that Heaney red Ted Hughes' 'Lupercal', and, in his words, 'suddenly, the matter of contemporary poetry was the material of my own life'. Subsequently, Heaney was introduced to the poetry of Patrick Kavanagh and then joined the Belfast group of young poets, publishing his first collection, 'Eleven Poems', at the age of 26.

Thus has followed a highly succesful literary career, spotted with numerous teaching posts, including the Professor of Poetry at Oxford University. He has written 11 main collections, the last of which won the T.S. Eliot Prize, as well as two plays and several popular translations. Much of his work has, at times, a distinctly nationalistic feel, and Heaney himself even objected at being included in the 1982 'Penguin Book of Contemporary British Poetry'. Yet surely his crowning achievement was being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1995, for 'works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past'. 

On this day...

American author John Steinbeck, died in 1968 at the age of 66. Of both German and Irish descent, Steinbeck was born in Salinas, and used the location as the setting for many of his novels. The migrant workers which he encountered there, and the severity of such an existance, became prominent themes in his writings; intertwining with the Great Depression, which occupied much of his early life. Steinbeck's literary career is most notable for his so-called 'dust bowl' fiction; a sequence of induvidual novels based on the futilityof the American Dream for the common people. Of these, the most famous is 'The Grapes of Wrath', a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1940. Yet the novel caused outrage among some, for its negative representation of capitalism, and led to Kern County banning the book from public schools and libraries for two years. After a year as the World War Two correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune, Steinbeck returned to novels, producing such works as 'East of Eden' and 'The Pearl'. Steinbeck was award the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962, for his 'realistic and imaginative writing'.

Transylvanian stakes claim for literature award...

Today, on the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death, five new Nobel Laureates received their prizes at award ceremonies in Olso and Stockholm respectively. Representing fields from physics to peace, the list of new Laureates included Herta Muller; the 2009 winner for literature. The Romanian author, best known for works about life in the Communist regime, was rewarded for 'the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose' which 'depicts the landscape of the dispossessed'. Earlier this week, 'stunned' Muller, who receives £900,000, gave her Nobel Lecture, a tradition which is always held in the days prior to the ceremony. Former Literatures Laureates include William Butler Yates, George Bernard Shaw, John Steinbeck, Seamus Heaney and even Winston Churchill.

On this day...

Alfred Nobel signed his last will and testament in Paris in 1895, leaving a large proportion of his estate for the establishment of a prize. Best known as the inventor of dynamite, the Swedish chemist had been prompted to do this, after a premature obituary 7 years previous, in which it said: 'Dr. Alfred Nobel, who became rich by finding ways to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday'. His subsequent wish to leave a greater legacy meant that 31,225,000 Swedish Kronor were given to fund 5 prizes; one in physical science, one in chemistry, another in medicine, the fourth for literary work 'in a ideal direction', and the final one for service to the international fraternity. After Nobel's death in 1896, his family refused to follow these instructions, and therefore it was not until 1901 that the first Nobel Prizes were awarded. The list of Literature Laureates is prestigious, and includes names such as William Butler Yeats, George Bernard Shaw, John Steinbeck, Seamus Heaney and even Winston Churchill. To date there have been 102 Laureates.

Farmer's obituary?...

Beverley Farmer has become the latest recipient of the Patrick White Award. The award was created by White in 1974, using the grant he had received for winning the Nobel Prize for Literature one year earlier. It acknowledges writers, usually older writers, who have not received adequate recognition for their years of creative work. Australian Farmer, whose best works include 'Milk', and 'Alone', has previously criticised the award for being obituary for the winner's literary career. She was awarded the $25,000 prize for being, 'not a prolific writer but rather an intense, meditative and gifted stylist.'

On this day...

Albert Camus, an Algerian-born, French writer, was born in 1913. Camus, also a philosophical authority, was often cited as being an advocate of exisitentialist thought, in which induvidual should primarily be concerned with their own existance; yet Camus himself denied this. He later became associated with absurdism, which deems the search by humanity for meaning in the universe to be futile. Influenced by figures such as Orwell and Dostoevsky, Camus tranferred these ideas into novels; producing such works as 'The Stranger', 'The Plague' and 'The Fall'. Camus was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957 for illuminating 'the problems of the human conscience in our times', becoming the first African-born writer and second youngest recipient of the award. He died in 1960, earning him the undesirable title of shortest-lived literature laureate to date.

Nobel Eliot...

T.S. Eliot received the Nobel Prize for Literature 61 years ago today. The American, as one of the most popular poets in the modern era, was recognised for 'his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry.' He studied at both Harvard and Oxford, later deciding to reside permanently in England and became a British subject in 1927. Eliot's literary career started whilst he was working at Lloyd's Bank, founding a critical quarterly 'Criterion', and writing his first poem 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock'. This work was the first of Eliot's 'new' style of poetry, identified through fragmented images and use of blank verse; a style epitomised in Eliot's most famous poem 'The Waste Land'. Eliot died in 1965, aged 76.

On this day...

Irish playwright, George Bernard Shaw died in 1950 at the age of 94. As a member of the Fabian society, Shaw was a committed socialist, and many of the ideology's concepts have found their way into Shaw's work; prominent themes including class division, religion, government and feminism. Arguably his most famous work is 'Pygmalion', which was adapted by Shaw for the screen in a 1938 movie. The success of this film won Shaw an Oscar for best screenplay and three further nominations, and to this date he is the only person to have been awarded both an Oscar and the Nobel Prize for Literature - the latter in 1925. 'Pygmalion' has since been adapted in a broadway musical, and later a film, called 'My Fair Lady'. An equally impressive part of Shaw's great legacy is the founding of the London School of Economics, which he undertook with three fellow Fabians in 1895.

On this day...

Doris Lessing was born in 1919. She is an Iranian-born British writer, most famous for novels such as 'The Golden Notebook' and 'The Grass is Singing'. However, she also advocated combatting social injustice, being an active campaigner against both nuclear arms and the South African Apartheid. In order to demostrate the difficulty that new authors face in trying to get published in print, she wrote two novels under a pseudonym. To prove her point, both were declined by her UK publisher. She won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2007, at the age of 87, making her the oldest recipient of the prize to date.