 1944 Nobel Prize in Literature | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Johannes V. Jensen | ||||
 "for the rare strength and fertility of his poetic imagination with which is combined an intellectual curiosity of wide scope and a bold, freshly creative style." | ||||
| Date |
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| Location | Stockholm, Sweden | |||
| Presented by | Swedish Academy | |||
| First award | 1901 | |||
| Website | Official website | |||
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The1944Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the Danish authorJohannes V. Jensen "for the rare strength and fertility of his poetic imagination with which is combined an intellectual curiosity of wide scope and a bold, freshly creative style."[1] He is the fourth Danish recipient of the literary prize.
Jensens early works was in thefin-de-siècle pessimism style. He found his own voice as a writer withHimmerlandshistorier ("Himmerland Stories", 1898–1910), comprising a series of tales set in the part of Denmark where he was born. This was followed by the acclaimed historical novelThe Fall of the King (1900-1901) centred on the Danish 16th century KingChristian II. The novel seriesDen lange rejse ("The Long Journey", 1908–22), spanning the early history of humanity in six volumes with a focus onevolutionary theory, is regarded as Jensens greatest achievement. In addition to these books, Jensen wrote numerous prose works and essays and was also a prominent poet. HisDigte ("Poems", 1906) is regarded as the start ofmodernist poetry in Denmark.[2]
Jensen had been nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature on 53 occasions since1925. He was nominated every year between1931 and 1944. In1942 the Nobel committee received seven nominations for Jensen, followed by two nominations in1943 and two nominations in 1944.[3]
In total, the Nobel committee received 24 nominations for 21 writers includingGabriela Mistral (awarded in1945),Hermann Hesse (awarded in1946),Enrique Larreta,Johan Huizinga,Georges Duhamel,John Steinbeck (awarded in1962) andPaul Valéry. Four were newly nominated namely Abol-Gassem E’tessam Zadeh, Luis Nueda y Santiago,Charles Ferdinand Ramuz andArnulf Øverland.Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício,Henriette Charasson,Elisaveta Bagryana andGabriela Mistral were the only women nominated.[4]
The authorsGeorge Ade,Joaquín Álvarez Quintero,Marc Bloch,Max Brand,Édouard Bourdet,Joseph Campbell,Jean Cavaillès,Irvin S. Cobb,Olive Custance,Eugénio de Castro,Antoine de Saint-Exupéry,Enrique Díez Canedo,Agnes Mary Frances Duclaux,Edith Durham,Benjamin Fondane,Giovanni Gentile,Henri Ghéon,Jean Giraudoux,Philippe Henriot,Max Jacob,Napoleon Lapathiotis,Stephen Leacock,Elsa Lindberg-Dovlette,Filippo Tommaso Marinetti,Kaj Munk,Robert Nichols,Augusta Peaux,Karel Poláček,Armand Praviel,Arthur Quiller-Couch,Miklós Radnóti,Jacques Roumain,Israel Joshua Singer,Ida Tarbell,Florence Trail,Hüseyin Rahmi Gürpınar,Margery Williams, andHarold Bell Wright died in 1944 without having been nominated for the prize.
| No. | Nominee | Country | Genre(s) | Nominator(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Elisaveta Bagryana (1893–1991) |  Bulgaria | poetry, translation | Stefan Mladenov (1880–1963)[a] |
| 2 | Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948) |  Soviet Union(  Ukraine) | philosophy, theology | Alf Nyman (1884–1968) |
| 3 | René Béhaine (1880–1966) |  France | novel, short story, essays | Maurice Mignon (1882–1962) |
| 4 | Edmund Blunden (1896–1974) |  United Kingdom | poetry, essays, biography | Heinrich Wolfgang Donner (1904-1980) |
| 5 | Henriette Charasson (1884–1972) | France | poetry, essays, drama, novel, literary criticism, biography |
|
| 6 | Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício (1884–1947) |  Portugal | poetry, essays | António Baião (1878–1961) |
| 7 | Teixeira de Pascoaes (1877–1952) | Portugal | poetry | João António Mascarenhas Júdice (1898–1957) |
| 8 | Georges Duhamel (1884–1966) | France | novel, short story, poetry, drama, literary criticism | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 9 | Abol-Gassem E'tessam Zadeh (?) |  Iran | novel, essays | Issa Sepahbodi (1896–?) |
| 10 | Vilhelm Grønbech (1873–1948) |  Denmark | history, essays, poetry | Sven Lönborg (1871–1959) |
| 11 | Hermann Hesse (1877–1962) |  Germany Switzerland | novel, poetry, essays, short story | Anders Österling (1884–1981) |
| 12 | Johan Huizinga (1872–1945) |  Netherlands | history | Willem van Eysinga (1878–1961) |
| 13 | Johannes Vilhelm Jensen (1873–1950) | Denmark | novel, short story, essays |
|
| 14 | Enrique Larreta (1875–1961) |  Argentina | history, essays, drama, novel |
|
| 15 | Gabriela Mistral (1889–1957) |  Chile | poetry | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 16 | Charles Langbridge Morgan (1894–1958) | United Kingdom | drama, novel, essays, poetry | Sigfrid Siwertz (1882–1970) |
| 17 | Luis Nueda y Santiago (1883–1952) |  Spain | essays | Julio Casares (1877–1964) |
| 18 | Arnulf Øverland (1889–1968) |  Norway | poetry, essays | Rolv Thesen (1896–1966) |
| 19 | Charles Ferdinand Ramuz (1878–1947) | Switzerland | novel, poetry, short story | Sigfrid Siwertz (1882–1970) |
| 20 | John Steinbeck (1902–1968) |  United States | novel, short story, screenplay | Erik Lönnroth (1910–2002) |
| 21 | Paul Valéry (1871–1945) | France | poetry, philosophy, essays, drama | Ernst Paulus Bendz (1880–1966) |
On 10 December 1944 a luncheon was held at theWaldorf-Astoria in New York in place of the customary ceremony in Stockholm.Per Hallström, chairman of the Nobel committee of theSwedish Academy, delivered a lecture on the Nobel Prize laureate in literature that was broadcast the same day. Unable to attend the 1944 award ceremony, Johannes V. Jensen received his prize at Stockholm on 10 December 1945.[5]
At the award ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December 1945Anders Österling, permanent secretary of theSwedish Academy said:
This child of the dry and windy moors of Jutland has, almost out of spite, astonished his contemporaries by a remarkably prolific production. He could well be considered one of the most fertile Scandinavian writers. He has constructed a vast and imposing literary œuvre, comprising the most diverse genres: epic and lyric, imaginative and realistic works, as well as historical and philosophical essays, not to mention his scientific excursions in all directions.[6]
