1908 Nobel Prize in Literature

{{Main article|Rudolf Christoph Eucken}}

Rudolf Eucken centered his philosophy on the human experience. He maintained that man is the meeting place of nature and spirit and that it is man's duty to overcome his nonspiritual nature by actively striving after the spiritual life. Some of his major works are Die Einheit des Geisteslebens ("The Unity of the Spiritual Life", 1888), Geistige Strömungen der Gegenwart ("Main Currents of Modern Thoughts", 1908), Der Sinn und Wert des Lebens ("The Meaning and Value of Life", 1908), Können wir noch Christen sein? ("Can We Still Be Christians?", 1911), and Der Sozialismus und seine Lebensgestaltung ("Individual and Society", 1923).[https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1908/eucken/facts/ Rudolf Eucken – Facts] nobelprize.org[https://www.britannica.com/biography/Rudolf-Christoph-Eucken#:~:text=Rudolf%20Christoph%20Eucken%2C%20(born%20Jan,works%20in%20ethics%20and%20religion. Rudolf Christoph Eucken] britannica.com

Eucken had never been nominated for the prize before, making him one of the 10 laureates who won on a rare occasion when they have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature the same year they were first nominated.[https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/facts/facts-on-the-nobel-prize-in-literature/ Facts on the Nobel Prize in Literature] nobelprize.org He received a single nomination from a member of the Swedish Academy.[https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/list.php?prize=4&year=1908 Nomination archive – 1908] nobelprize.org

In total, the academy received 23 nominations for 16 writers. Among the nominees include Jaroslav Vrchlický, Selma Lagerlöf (awarded in 1909), John Morley, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and Antonio Fogazzaro. Six of the nominees were newly nominated such as the controversial Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, Adolf von Harnack, Julio Calcaño and Edmondo De Amicis.

The authors Vicente Acosta, Anton Giulio Barrili, Wilhelm Busch, Julia Abigail Cartney, Karl Josef Rudolph Cornely, Manuel Curros Enríquez, Joaquim Machado de Assis, Alexander Ertel, Carl Ewald, Louis-Honoré Fréchette, Joel Chandler Harris, Ludovic Halévy, Bronson Howard, Jonas Lie, Aurora Ljungstedt, Jadwiga Łuszczewska, Otto Pfleiderer, Anthony Winkler Prins, Maria Louise Ramé (known as Ouida), Evgeny Salias De Tournemire, Victorien Sardou, Susan Marr Spalding, Edmund Clarence Stedman, and Aleksey Zhemchuzhnikov died in 1908 without having been nominated for the prize. Italian novelist Edmondo de Amicis died months before the announcement.

For the 1908 prize, the main candidates were English poet Algernon Swinburne and the Swedish writer Selma Lagerlöf.Gustav Källstrand Andens Olympiska Spel: Nobelprisets historia, Fri Tanke 2021, p. 192 Nobel Committee chair Carl David af Wirsén was against Lagerlöf for her radical styles and campaigned for Swinburne. Being divided between Swinburne and Lagerlöf, the committee, as a compromise choice, launched the German philosopher Rudolf Eucken as an alternative candidate that could be agreed upon and a representative of the Academy's interpretation of Nobel's ideal direction.Wilhelm Odelberg, Nobel: The Man and His Prizes, p. 97.

The choice of philosopher Rudolf Christoph Eucken as Nobel laureate in 1908 is widely considered to be one of the worst mistakes in the history of the Nobel Prize in Literature.Helmer Lång, 100 nobelpris i litteratur 1901–2001, Symposion 2001, pp. 25, 56. The Swedish Academy's handling of the prize decision was heavily criticized at the time. Burton Feldman, author of The Nobel Prize: A History of Geniuses Controversy, and Prestige describes Eucken as a laureate "so forgotten that even philosophers are usually surprised he was a philosopher."Burton Feldman, The Nobel Prize: A History of Geniuses Controversy, and Prestige, p. 52 While journalist Stuart Reid of The Atlantic describes him as "a deservedly forgotten philosopher who was never important."{{cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/12/nobel-quibbles/305471/|title=Nobel Quibbles: When it comes to the Nobel Prize, controversy and debate have always been the name of the game|author=Stuart Reid|date=December 2003|access-date=21 May 2021|website=The Atlantic}}

Eucken delivered a Nobel lecture entitled Naturalism or Idealism? on 27 March 1909 at Stockholm.[https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1908/eucken/lecture/ Nobel lecture – Rudolf Eucken] nobelprize.org

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• [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1905/ceremony-speech/ Award ceremony speech by Harald Hjärne] nobelprize.org

{{Nobel Prize in Literature}}

1908

Nobel