 1948 Nobel Prize in Literature | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thomas Stearns Eliot | ||||
 "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry." | ||||
| Date |
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| Location | Stockholm, Sweden | |||
| Presented by | Swedish Academy | |||
| First award | 1901 | |||
| Website | Official website | |||
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The1948Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to British-American poetThomas Stearns Eliot (pen name, T. S. Eliot) (1888–1965) "for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry."[2] Eliot is the fourth British (born in the United States) recipient of the prize afterJohn Galsworthy in 1932.
T.S. Eliot was a highly influential poet known for works such asThe Waste Land (1922) andFour Quartets (1940). His belief that poetry should aim to represent the complexities of modern civilization made him one of the most daring innovators of 20th century poetry. He also wrote essays and plays such asMurder in the Cathedral (1935).[3]
T.S. Eliot was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature on seven occasions, the first time in1945. In 1948, three nominations for Eliot were submitted which eventually led to him being awarded the prize.[4]
In total, the Nobel committee received 45 nominations for 32 writers includingAndré Malraux,Georges Duhamel,Winston Churchill (awarded in1953),Toyohiko Kagawa,Boris Pasternak (awarded in1958),Nikolai Berdyaev,Mikhail Sholokov (awarded in1965),Shmuel Yosef Agnon (awarded in1966),Angelos Sikelianos,Mark Aldanov, andArnulf Øverland.[5] Seven of the nominees were nominated first-time among themGeorge Santayana,Zalman Shneur,George Macauley Trevelyan,Halldór Laxness (awarded in1955), andRiccardo Bacchelli. Three of the nominees were women:Marie Under,Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette andDorothy Canfield Fisher.[5]
The 1929 Nobel Prize laureateThomas Mann was unconventionally nominated for a second prize by two members of theSwedish Academy.[6] The authorsAntonin Artaud,Charles A. Beard,Georges Bernanos,Alice Brown,Wilbur Lucius Cross,Osamu Dazai,André Fontainas,Susan Glaspell,Frederick Philip Grove,Victor Ido,Klara Johanson,Aldo Leopold,Monteiro Lobato,Emil Ludwig,Claude McKay,Thomas Mofolo,Na Hye-sok,Sextil Pușcariu,Antonin Sertillanges,Montague Summers, andMarcelle Tinayre died in 1948 without having been nominated for the prize. Russian philosopherNikolai Berdyaev died months before the announcement.
| No. | Nominee | Country | Genre(s) | Nominator(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mark Aldanov (1886–1957) |  Soviet Union(  Ukraine) France | biography, novel, essays, literary criticism |  Ivan Bunin (1870–1953) |
| 2 | Shmuel Yosef Agnon (1887–1970) |  Israel | novel, short story | Martin Lamm (1880–1950) |
| 3 | Eugène Baie (1874–1964) |  Belgium | law, essays |
|
| 4 | Riccardo Bacchelli (1891–1985) |  Italy | novel, drama, essays | Accademia dei Lincei |
| 5 | Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948) | Soviet Union ( Ukraine) | philosophy, theology | Alf Nyman (1884–1968) |
| 6 | René Béhaine (1880–1966) | France | novel, short story, essays | Maurice Mignon (1882–1962) |
| 7 | Dorothy Canfield Fisher (1879–1958) |  United States | novel, short story, pedagogy, essays | David Baumgardt (1890–1963)[a] |
| 8 | Winston Churchill (1874–1965) |  United Kingdom | history, essays, memoir |
|
| 9 | Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (1873–1954) | France | novel, short story | Claude Farrère (1876–1957) |
| 10 | Benedetto Croce (1866–1952) | Italy | history, philosophy, law | Accademia dei Lincei |
| 11 | Teixeira de Pascoaes (1877–1952) |  Portugal | poetry | João António Mascarenhas Júdice (1898–1957) |
| 12 | Georgios Drossinis (1859–1951) |  Greece | poetry, novel, short story | Geōrgios Oikonomos (1882–1951) |
| 13 | Georges Duhamel (1884–1966) | France | novel, short story, poetry, drama, literary criticism |
|
| 14 | Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888–1965) | United StatesUnited Kingdom | poetry, essays, drama |
|
| 15 | Johan Falkberget (1879–1967) |  Norway | novel, short story, essays |
|
| 16 | Franz Hellens (1881–1972) | Belgium | novel, poetry, literary criticism | Anders Österling (1884–1981) |
| 17 | Toyohiko Kagawa (1888–1960) |  Japan | essays | Sven Hedin (1865–1952) |
| 18 | Rudolf Kassner (1873–1959) |  Austria | philosophy, essays, translation | Theophil Spoerri (1890–1974) |
| 19 | Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) |  Iceland | novel, short story, drama, poetry |
|
| 20 | André Malraux (1901–1976) | France | novel, essays, literary criticism | Justin O'Brien (1906–1968) |
| 21 | Thomas Mann (1875–1955) |  Germany | novel, short story, essays |
|
| 22 | Ramón Menéndez Pidal (1869–1968) |  Spain | philology, history | Gunnar Tilander (1894–1973) |
| 23 | Charles Langbridge Morgan (1894–1958) | United Kingdom | drama, novel, essays, poetry | Otto Funke |
| 24 | Arnulf Øverland (1889–1968) | Norway | poetry, essays |
|
| 25 | Boris Pasternak (1890–1960) | Soviet Union | poetry, novel, translation | Martin Lamm (1880–1950) |
| 26 | Jules Romains (1885–1972) | France | poetry, drama, screenplay | Alfred Jolivet (1885–1966) |
| 27 | George Santayana (1863–1952) | SpainUnited States | philosophy, essays, poetry, novel | Justin O'Brien (1906–1968) |
| 28 | Zalman Shneour (1887–1959) | Soviet Union (  Belarus)United States | poetry, essays | Joseph Klausner (1874–1958) |
| 29 | Mikhail Sholokhov (1905–1984) | Soviet Union | novel | Nobel Committee (unspecified) |
| 30 | Angelos Sikelianos (1884–1951) | Greece | poetry, drama |
|
| 31 | George Macauley Trevelyan (1876–1962) | United Kingdom | biography, autobiography, essays, history | Nils Ahnlund (1889–1957) |
| 32 | Marie Under (1883–1980) | Soviet Union (  Estonia) | poetry | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
In his 1948 report,Nobel committee chairmanAnders Österling mentioned the possibility of a shared prize between T. S. Eliot and the Greek poetAngelos Sikelianos, but immediately rejected the idea referring to it "as where both are considered, it would certainly be considered a disparagement".[7]
At the award ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December 1948,Anders Österling, permanent secretary of theSwedish Academy, said of Eliot:
His career is remarkable in that, from an extremely exclusive and consciously isolated position, he has gradually come to exercise a very far-reaching influence. At the outset he appeared to address himself to but a small circle of initiates, but this circle slowly widened, without his appearing to will it himself. Thus in Eliot's verse and prose there was quite a special accent, which compelled attention just in our own time, a capacity to cut into the consciousness of our generation with the sharpness of a diamond.[8]
