1947 Nobel Prize in Literature
{{Infobox award
| name = 20px 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature
| subheader = André Gide
| awarded_for =
| presenter = Swedish Academy
| year = 1901
| website = {{oweb|https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1947/summary/}}
| holder_label =
| holder =
| image = André Gide 1947.jpg
| caption = "for his comprehensive and artistically significant writings, in which human problems and conditions have been presented with a fearless love of truth and keen psychological insight"
| host =
| date = {{plainlist|
- 13 November 1947 (announcement)
- 10 December 1947
(ceremony)
}}
| location = Stockholm, Sweden
| previous = 1946
| main = Nobel Prize in Literature
| next = 1948
}}
The 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the French author André Gide "for his comprehensive and artistically significant writings, in which human problems and conditions have been presented with a fearless love of truth and keen psychological insight".{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1947/summary/ |title=The Nobel Prize in Literature 1947 |publisher=nobelprize.org}}{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1947/11/14/archives/gide-gets-nobel-literature-prize-britons-win-in-physics-chemistry.html|title=Gide Gets Nobel Literature Prize|date=14 November 1947|website=New York Times}}
Laureate
{{Main|André Gide}}
André Gide's early works such as the prose poem Les nourritures terrestres ("Fruits of the Earth", 1897) were influenced by French symbolism. Later notable works include The L'Immoraliste ("The Immoralist", 1902), La Porte Étroite ("Strait is the Gate", 1907) and La Symphonie pastorale ("The Pastoral Symphony", 1919). The autobiographical Si le grain ne meurt ("If It Die...", 1924) is regarded as one of the great works of confessional literature. In 1926, his most complex novel Les faux-monnayeurs ("The Counterfeiters") was published.{{Cite web|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Andre-Gide |title=André Gide |publisher=britannica.com }}
Deliberations
=Nominations=
André Gide had only been nominated for the prize once before in 1946.{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show_people.php?id=3426 |title=Nomination archive - André Gide |date=21 May 2024 |publisher=nobelprize.org }} In 1947, the Nobel committee received 43 nominations for 35 writers including T. S. Eliot (awarded in 1948), Boris Pasternak (awarded in 1958), Teixeira de Pascoaes, Jules Romains, Angelos Sikelianos, Carl Sandburg, Georges Duhamel, Ignazio Silone, Benedetto Croce, Ramon Perez de Ayala, Arnulf Øverland, Johan Falkberget and Marie Under. Eleven were nominated first-time such as Pär Lagerkvist (awarded in 1951), Ernest Hemingway (awarded in 1954), Mikhail Sholokov (awarded in 1965), Shmuel Yosef Agnon (awarded in 1966), Toyohiko Kagawa, Georgios Drossinis, Nikos Kazantzakis, Bernard O'Dowd and André Malraux. Most nominations were submitted for Henriette Charasson and Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz with three nominations each. Four were female nominees namely Henriette Charasson, Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício, Maila Talvio and Marie Under.{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/list.php?prize=4&year=1947 |title=Nomination archive – 1947|date=April 2020 |publisher=nobelprize.org }}
The authors James Agate, Marie Belloc Lowndes, J. D. Beresford, Tristan Bernard, Jean-Richard Bloch, Svend Borberg, Wolfgang Borchert, Margaret Cameron, Emilio Carrere, Willa Cather, Sigurd Christiansen, Winston Churchill, Morris Raphael Cohen, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Max Dessoir, Léon-Paul Fargue, Joaquín Gallegos Lara, Edith Maud Hull, Richard Le Gallienne, William Le Queux, Gurli Linder, Hugh Lofting, Manuel Machado, Arthur Machen, Emma Orczy, Nicholas Roerich, Margaret Marshall Saunders, Balys Sruoga, Flora Thompson, E. C. Vivian, Swami Vipulananda and Alfred North Whitehead died in 1947 without having been nominated for the prize.
| class="sortable wikitable mw-collapsible"
|+ class="nowrap" | Official list of nominees and their nominators for the prize |
|
! scope=col | No. ! scope=col | Nominee ! scope=col | Country ! scope=col | Genre(s) ! scope=col | Nominator(s) |
| 1
|Mark Aldanov (1886–1957) |{{flag|Soviet Union}} |biography, novel, essays, literary criticism |20px Ivan Bunin (1870–1953) |
| 2
|Shmuel Yosef Agnon (1887–1970) |{{flag|Mandatory Palestine}} |novel, short story |Hugo Bergmann (1883–1975) |
| 3
|Sholem Asch (1880–1957) |{{flag|Polish People's Republic|name=Poland}} |novel, short story, drama, essays |Walter Arthur Berendsohn (1884–1984) |
| 4
|Eugène Baie (1874–1964) |{{flag|Belgium}} |law, essays |20px Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949) |
| 5
|Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948) |{{flag|Soviet Union}} |philosophy, theology |Alf Nyman (1884–1968) |
| 6
|Henriette Charasson (1884–1972) |{{flag|French Fourth Republic|name=France}} |poetry, essays, drama, novel, literary criticism, biography |{{unbulleted list|Serge Barrault (1887–1976)|Pierre Fernessole (1879–1965)|Pierre Moreau (1895–1972)}} |
| 7
|Benedetto Croce (1866–1952) |{{flag|Italy}} |history, philosophy, law |Bernardino Barbadoro (1889–1961) |
| 8
|Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício (1884–1947) |{{flag|Estado Novo (Portugal)|name=Portugal}} |poetry, essays |António Baião (1878–1961) |
| 9
|Teixeira de Pascoaes (1877–1952) |{{flag|Estado Novo (Portugal)|name=Portugal}} |poetry |João António Mascarenhas Júdice (1898–1957) |
| 10
|Georgios Drossinis (1859–1951) |{{flag|Kingdom of Greece|name=Greece}} |poetry, novel, short story |{{unbulleted list|Geōrgios Oikonomos (1882–1951)|Phaidōn Koukoules (1881–1956)|Iōannēs Kalitsounakēs (1878–1966){{efn|group=notes|name=xeno|Several other members of the Academy of Athens joined in the nomination.}}}} |
| 11
|Georges Duhamel (1884–1966) |{{flag|French Fourth Republic|name=France}} |novel, short story, poetry, drama, literary criticism |{{unbulleted list|Denis Saurat (1890–1958)|Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953)}} |
| 12
|Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888–1965) |{{flag|United States|1912}} |poetry, essays, drama |Gustaf Hellström (1882–1953) |
| 13
|Johan Falkberget (1879–1967) |{{flag|Norway}} |novel, short story, essays |{{unbulleted list|Eivind Berggrav (1884–1959)|Harry Fett (1875–1962)}} |
| style="background:gold;white-space:nowrap"|14
| style="background:gold;white-space:nowrap"|André Gide (1869–1951) | style="background:gold;white-space:nowrap"|{{flag|French Fourth Republic|name=France}} | style="background:gold;white-space:nowrap"|novel, short story, poetry, drama, memoir, essays | style="background:gold;white-space:nowrap"|Lorentz Eckhoff (1884–1974) |
| 15
|Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) |{{flag|United States|1912}} |novel, short story, screenplay |Hjalmar Gullberg (1898–1961) |
| 16
|Toyohiko Kagawa (1888–1960) |{{flag|Empire of Japan|name=Japan}} |essays |Knut Westman (1881–1967) |
| 17
|Horace Kallen (1882–1974) |{{flag|United States|1912}} |philosophy, essays |Louise Rosenblatt (1904–2005) |
| 18
|Nikos Kazantzakis (1883–1957) |{{flag|Kingdom of Greece|name=Greece}} |novel, philosophy, essays, drama, memoir, translation |Nikos Athanasiou Veēs (1882–1958){{efn|group=notes|name=vees|Veēs suggests that the Prize be possibly shared by Sikelianos and Kazantzakis.}} |
| 19
|Pär Lagerkvist (1891–1974) |{{flag|Sweden}} |poetry, novel, short story, drama |Henrik Schück (1855–1947) |
| 20
|André Malraux (1901–1976) |{{flag|French Fourth Republic|name=France}} |novel, essays, literary criticism |Henri Peyre (1901–1988) |
| 21
|Charles Langbridge Morgan (1894–1958) |{{flag|United Kingdom}} |drama, novel, essays, poetry |Sigfrid Siwertz (1882–1970) |
| 22
|Bernard O'Dowd (1866–1953) |{{flag|Australia}} |poetry, essays |{{unbulleted list|Ian Ramsay Maxwell (1901–1979)|Several other professors from Australia and New Zealand}} |
| 23
|Arnulf Øverland (1889–1968) |{{flag|Norway}} |poetry, essays |Harry Fett (1875–1962) |
| 24
|Boris Pasternak (1890–1960) |{{flag|Soviet Union}} |poetry, novel, translation |Maurice Bowra (1898–1971) |
| 25
|Branislav Petronijević (1875–1954) |{{flag|Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia|name=Yugoslavia}} |philosophy |Vladeta Popović (1894–1951) |
| 26
|Ramón Pérez de Ayala (1880–1962) |{{flag|Francoist Spain|name=Spain}} |novel, poetry, literary criticism |Edgar Allison Peers (1891–1952) |
| 27
|Charles Ferdinand Ramuz (1878–1947) |{{flag|Switzerland}} |novel, poetry, short story |{{unbulleted list|Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953)|Henri de Ziégler (1885–1970)|Albert Béguin (1901–1957)}} |
| 28
|Jules Romains (1885–1972) |{{flag|French Fourth Republic|name=France}} |poetry, drama, screenplay |{{unbulleted list|Holger Sten (1907–1971)|Lorentz Eckhoff (1884–1974)}} |
| 29
|Carl Sandburg (1878–1967) |{{flag|United States|1912}} |poetry, essays, biography |Einar Tegen (1884–1965) |
| 30
|Mikhail Sholokhov (1905–1984) |{{flag|Soviet Union}} |novel |Henry Olsson (1896–1985) |
| 31
|Angelos Sikelianos (1884–1951) |{{flag|Kingdom of Greece|name=Greece}} |poetry, drama |Nikos Athanasiou Veēs (1882–1958){{efn|name=vees}} |
| 32
|Ignazio Silone (1900–1978) |{{flag|Italy}} |novel, short story, essays, drama |Fredrik Böök (1883–1961) |
| 33
|Maila Talvio (1871–1951) |{{flag|Finland}} |novel, short story, translation |Veikko Antero Koskenniemi (1885–1962) |
| 34
|Marie Under (1883–1980) |{{flag|Soviet Union}} |poetry |Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 35
|Gregorios Xenopoulos (1867–1951) |{{flag|Kingdom of Greece|name=Greece}} |novel, drama, essays, literary criticism |Iōannēs Kalitsounakēs (1878–1966){{efn|name=xeno}} |
Award ceremony
At the award ceremony in Stockholm on 10 December 1947, Anders Österling, permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy, said:
{{Quote|Behind the strange and incessant shift in perspective that Gide’s work offers to us, in the novels as well as in the essays, in the travel diaries, or in the analyses of contemporary events, we always find the same supple intelligence, the same incorruptible psychology, expressed in a language which, by the most sober means, attains a wholly classic limpidity and the most delicate variety. (...)
Through all the phases of his evolution, Gide has appeared as a true defender of literary integrity, founded on the personality’s right and duty to present all its problems resolutely and honestly. From this point of view, his long and varied activity, stimulated in so many ways, unquestionably represents an idealistic value.{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1947/ceremony-speech/ |title=Award ceremony speech |publisher=nobelprize.org }}
}}
For reasons of health, André Gide was unable to be present at the award ceremony. His prize was accepted by the French ambassador.
Notes
{{notelist}}
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1947/ceremony-speech/ Award ceremony speech] nobelprize.org
- [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1947/gide/speech/ Banquet speech] nobelprize.org
{{Nobel Prize in Literature}}