2016 Nobel Prize in Literature

{{main article|Bob Dylan}}

Bob Dylan's songs are rooted in the rich tradition of American folk music and are influenced by the poets of modernism and the beatnik movement. Early on, Dylan's lyrics incorporated social struggles and political protest. Love and religion are other important themes in his songs. His writing is often characterized by refined rhymes and it paints surprising, sometimes surreal imagery. Since his debut in 1962, he has repeatedly reinvented his songs and music. He has also written prose, including his poetry collection Tarantula (1971) and his memoirs Chronicles: Volume One (2004).[https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2016/dylan/facts/ Bob Dylan Facts] nobelprize.org

File:Bob Dylan June 23 1978.jpg

The Nobel Prize committee announced on October 13, 2016, that it would be awarding Dylan the Nobel Prize in Literature "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition".{{cite web |date=October 13, 2016 |title=The Nobel Prize in Literature 2016 |url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2016/press.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20170920010410/https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2016/press.pdf |archive-date=September 20, 2017 |access-date=January 6, 2020 |publisher=Nobelprize.org}}{{cite web |date=October 13, 2016 |title=Bob Dylan wins 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature |url=https://edition.cnn.com/2016/10/13/world/nobel-prize-literature/ |access-date=October 19, 2016 |publisher=CNN}} Dylan remained silent for days after receiving the award,{{Cite news |agency=Agence France-Presse |date=October 22, 2016 |title=Bob Dylan criticised as 'impolite and arrogant' by Nobel academy member |newspaper=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/22/bob-dylan-criticised-as-impolite-and-arrogant-by-nobel-academy-member |access-date=October 22, 2016}} before telling journalist Edna Gundersen that getting the award was "amazing, incredible. Who ever dreams about something like that?"{{Cite news |author=Gundersen, Enda |date=October 28, 2016 |title=World exclusive: Bob Dylan – I'll be at the Nobel Prize ceremony... if I can |work=The Daily Telegraph |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/the-filter/world-exclusive-bob-dylan---ill-be-at-the-nobel-prize-ceremony-i |access-date=October 29, 2016}}

The Swedish Academy announced in November 2016 that Dylan would not travel to Stockholm for the Nobel Prize Ceremony due to "pre-existing commitments".{{cite web |date=November 16, 2016 |title=Bob Dylan has decided not to come to Stockholm |url=http://www.svenskaakademien.se/en/press/bob-dylan-has-decided-not-to-come-to-stockholm |access-date=November 17, 2016 |publisher=Svenska Akadamien}} At the Nobel Banquet in Stockholm on December 10, 2016, Dylan's speech was given by Azita Raji, U.S. Ambassador to Sweden. Patti Smith performed his song "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" to orchestral accompaniment.{{cite magazine |last=Petrusich |first=Amanda |date=December 10, 2016 |title=A Transcendent Patti Smith Accepts Bob Dylan's Nobel Prize |magazine=The New Yorker |url=https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/a-transcendent-patti-smith-accepts-bob-dylans-nobel-prize |via=www.newyorker.com}}

On April 2, 2017, academy secretary Sara Danius reported:

"Earlier today the Swedish Academy met with Bob Dylan for a private ceremony [with no media present] in Stockholm, during which Dylan received his gold medal and diploma. Twelve members of the Academy were present. Spirits were high. Champagne was had. Quite a bit of time was spent looking closely at the gold medal, in particular the beautifully crafted back, an image of a young man sitting under a laurel tree who listens to the Muse. Taken from Virgil's Aeneid, the inscription reads: Inventas vitam iuvat excoluisse per artes, loosely translated as 'And they who bettered life on earth by their newly found mastery'".{{cite web |author=Danius, Sara |date=April 2, 2017 |title=Bob Dylan has received the Nobel medal and diploma |url=https://akademibloggen.wordpress.com/2017/04/02/lordag-2359/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170402083413/https://akademibloggen.wordpress.com/2017/04/02/lordag-2359/ |archive-date=April 2, 2017 |access-date=April 2, 2017 |publisher=Swedish Academy |df=mdy-all}}

Dylan's Nobel Lecture was posted on the Nobel Prize website on June 5, 2017.{{cite web |last1=Bob |first1=Dylan |title=Bob Dylan – Nobel Lecture |url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2016/dylan-lecture.html |website=Nobelprize.org}} The New York Times pointed out that, in order to collect the prize's eight million Swedish kronor (US$900,000), the Swedish Academy's rules stipulate the laureate "must deliver a lecture within six months of the official ceremony, which would have made Mr. Dylan's deadline June 10".{{Cite news |author=Sisario, Ben |date=June 5, 2017 |title=Bob Dylan Delivers His Nobel Prize Lecture, Just in Time |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-prize-lecture-literature.html |access-date=June 12, 2017}} Academy secretary Danius commented: "The speech is extraordinary and, as one might expect, eloquent. Now that the lecture has been delivered, the Dylan adventure is coming to a close".{{Cite news |date=June 5, 2017 |title=Bob Dylan finally delivers his Nobel lecture |newspaper=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-40159988 |access-date=June 5, 2017}}

In his Nobel Prize lecture, Dylan wrote about the impact of three books on him: Herman Melville's Moby-Dick, Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front and Homer's Odyssey. He concluded:

"Our songs are alive in the land of the living. But songs are unlike literature. They're meant to be sung, not read. The words in Shakespeare's plays were meant to be acted on the stage. Just as lyrics in songs are meant to be sung, not read on a page. And I hope some of you get the chance to listen to these lyrics the way they were intended to be heard: in concert or on record or however people are listening to songs these days. I return once again to Homer, who says, 'Sing in me, oh Muse, and through me tell the story'".{{cite web |author=Dylan, Bob |date=June 6, 2017 |title=Bob Dylan's Nobel Lecture |url=http://www.svenskaakademien.se/en/nobel-lecture |access-date=June 5, 2017 |publisher=Swedish Academy}}

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References to poets and other writers have played a notable role in Dylan's work from the artist's early days in the 1960s and 70s. Dylan's lyrics over the decades have directly named, among others: William Blake, T.S. Eliot, Allen Ginsberg, Erica Jong, James Joyce, Jack Kerouac, Edgar Allan Poe, Ezra Pound, Arthur Rimbaud and William Shakespeare.{{Citation needed|date=May 2025}}

In 2017, the year after Dylan received his Nobel Prize, Harvard University Classics Professor Richard F. Thomas published a book entitled Why Bob Dylan Matters. In this work, Thomas suggests that Dylan's lyrics contain many literary allusions, including to the works of classic poets Homer, Ovid and Virgil. To support this claim, Thomas offered multiple examples of Dylan's 21st-century lyrics side-by-side with lines from these poets. Towards the beginning of his book, Thomas further argues for situating Dylan firmly alongside those whose work seems to have inspired him, noting: "For the past forty years, as a classics professor, I have been living in the worlds of the Greek and Roman poets, reading them, writing about them, and teaching them to students in their original languages and in English translation. I have for even longer been living in the world of Bob Dylan’s songs, and in my mind Dylan long ago joined the company of those ancient poets.".{{Cite book |last=Thomas |first=Richard F. |title=Why Bob Dylan Matters |publisher=HarperCollins Publishers |year=2017 |isbn=978-0-06-268573-5 |location=New York, New York |pages=2 |language=English}}

Thomas (2017) ends by addressing Dylan's Nobel Lecture, during which – the author points out – Dylan extensively discussed three particular works of literature and the impressions these works made on him: Homer's Odyssey, Moby-Dick by Herman Melville and All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque.{{Citation needed|date=May 2025}}

The 2016 choice of Bob Dylan was the first time a musician and songwriter won the Nobel for Literature.{{Cite news |last1=Sisario |first1=Ben |last2=Alter |first2=Alexandra |last3=Chan |first3=Sewell |date=October 13, 2016 |title=Bob Dylan Wins Nobel Prize, Redefining Boundaries of Literature |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-prize-literature.html |access-date=March 23, 2022}} The New York Times reported: "Mr. Dylan, 75, is the first musician to win the award, and his selection on Thursday is perhaps the most radical choice in a history stretching back to 1901."{{Cite news |author=Sisario, Ben |date=October 13, 2016 |title=Bob Dylan Wins Nobel Prize, Redefining Boundaries of Literature |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/14/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-prize-literature.html |access-date=October 14, 2016}}

Dylan's reception of the Nobel Prize caused controversy,{{Cite news |last=Thorpe |first=Vanessa |last2=Connett |first2=David |date=2016-12-11 |title=Bob Dylan Nobel prize speech: this is 'truly beyond words' |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/dec/11/bob-dylan-nobel-prize-i-never-considered-whether-i-was-producing-literature |access-date=2025-05-07 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077 |quote=The announcement that Dylan had won the literature prize caused controversy with critics arguing his lyrics were not literature.}}{{Cite news |last=Staff |date=2016-10-17 |title=Nobel panel gives up knockin’ on Dylan’s door |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/17/nobel-prize-bob-dylan-unable-to-reach |access-date=2025-05-07 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077 |quote=The award caused some controversy, particularly among writers arguing that the literary merits of Dylan’s work are not equal to those of some of his peers.}}{{Cite web |last=Burack |first=Cristina |date=2017-05-10 |title=Controversies that have dogged the Nobel for Literature – DW – 10/05/2017 |url=https://www.dw.com/en/controversies-that-have-dogged-the-nobel-prize-for-literature-awards/a-40819676 |url-status=live |access-date=2025-05-07 |website=dw.com |language=en |quote=the Academy's decision to bestow its distinguished literary award — and the accompanying $1.1 million (€937,000) prize — to Bob Dylan unleashed a storm of criticism, with many arguing the American musician and songwriter did not deserve an award that was typically bestowed on novelists, dramatists, and writers of non-fiction.}}{{Cite web |last=Kornhaber |first=Spencer |date=2017-06-14 |title=The Irony of Bob Dylan's Nobel Lecture Possibly Cribbing From SparkNotes |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/06/bob-dylan-nobel-spark-notes-plagarism/530283/ |access-date=2025-05-07 |website=The Atlantic |language=en |quote=Dylan’s Nobel has been controversial for its suggestion that popular music can achieve the same seriousness as a great novel.}} particularly among writers who argued that the literary merits of Dylan's work were not equal to those of more traditional authors. Writer Rabih Alameddine tweeted, "Bob Dylan winning a Nobel in Literature is like Mrs Fields being awarded 3 Michelin stars."[https://twitter.com/rabihalameddine/status/786575235143245824 Bob Dylan winning a Nobel in Literature is like Mrs Fields being awarded 3 Michelin stars], Rabih Alameddine's Twitter page, 13 October 2016. The French writer Pierre Assouline described the decision as "contemptuous of writers".[http://larepubliquedeslivres.com/le-bras-dhonneur-des-nobel-la-litterature-americaine/ Le bras d'honneur des Nobel à la littérature américaine], La Républic, Ocbtober 13, 2016. In a live webchat hosted by The Guardian, Norwegian writer Karl Ove Knausgård said: "I'm very divided. I love that the Nobel committee opens up for other kinds of literature – lyrics and so on. I think that's brilliant. But knowing that Dylan is the same generation as Thomas Pynchon, Philip Roth, Cormac McCarthy, makes it very difficult for me to accept it."[https://www.theguardian.com/books/live/2016/oct/13/karl-ove-knausgaard-webchat-some-rain-must-fall-my-struggle Karl Ove Knausgaard webchat – your questions answered on self-loathing, love and Jürgen Klopp], The Guardian, 17 October 2016. Scottish novelist Irvine Welsh said: "I'm a Dylan fan, but this is an ill conceived nostalgia award wrenched from the rancid prostates of senile, gibbering hippies."{{cite web |date=13 October 2016 |title=Don't think twice, it's all right: Bob Dylan wins Nobel Lit |url=https://www.yahoo.com/news/bob-dylan-wins-2016-nobel-prize-literature-110421880.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161013223638/https://www.yahoo.com/news/bob-dylan-wins-2016-nobel-prize-literature-110421880.html |archive-date=13 October 2016 |access-date=13 October 2016 |publisher=Yahoo! News |agency=Associated Press}}

Dylan's songwriting peer and friend Leonard Cohen said that no prizes were necessary to recognize "the greatness of the man who transformed pop music with records like Highway 61 Revisited", adding: "To me, [the Nobel] is like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain."[https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/14/leonard-cohen-giving-nobel-to-bob-dylan-like-pinning-medal-on-everest Leonard Cohen: giving Nobel to Bob Dylan like 'pinning medal on Everest'], Guardian, 13 October 2016. Writer and commentator Will Self wrote that the award "cheapened" Dylan whilst hoping the laureate would "follow Sartre in rejecting the award".{{cite news |title='Dylan towers over everyone' – Salman Rushdie, Kate Tempest and more pay tribute to Bob Dylan |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/13/dylan-towers-over-everyone-salman-rushdie-kate-tempest-and-more-pay-tribute-to-bob-dylan |access-date=14 October 2016 |work=The Guardian|date=13 October 2016 |last1=Cocker |first1=Jarvis |last2=Rushdie |first2=Salman |last3=Matthews |first3=Cerys |last4=Motion |first4=Andrew |last5=Self |first5=Will |last6=Bragg |first6=Billy |last7=O'Hagan |first7=Andrew |last8=Tempest |first8=Kate |last9=Great |first9=Emmy the |last10=Gibbons |first10=Billy F. |last11=Garvey |first11=Guy |last12=Mekas |first12=Jonas |last13=Tempest |first13=Kae }}

Other writers praised the decision, including Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, and Salman Rushdie and former U.S. poet laureate Billy Collins. Rushdie called Dylan a "brilliant inheritor of the bardic tradition."

An article in Slate magazine found multiple parts of Dylan's Nobel lecture that closely resembled the analysis of Moby-Dick on the study guide website SparkNotes, including a passage Dylan "quoted" that wasn't in the book itself.{{Cite news |last=Savage |first=Mark |date=2017-06-14 |title=Did Bob Dylan plagiarise his Nobel speech? |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-40272123 |access-date=2025-05-10 |work=The BBC |language=en-GB |quote=The investigation was prompted by the discovery that the musician had quoted a passage which does not appear in any current editions of Herman Melville's novel.}} An Associated Press analysis found that the two texts contained more than 20 "identical phrases and similar phrasing", but "no verbatim sentences".{{Cite news |last=Savage |first=Mark |date=June 14, 2017 |title=Did Bob Dylan plagiarise his Nobel speech? |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-40272123 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250220051904/https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-40272123 |archive-date=February 20, 2025 |access-date=February 20, 2025 |work=BBC}}{{Cite news |last=Kornhaber |first=Spencer |date=June 14, 2017 |title=Bob Dylan Cheats Again? |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/06/bob-dylan-nobel-spark-notes-plagarism/530283/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20210403121432/https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/06/bob-dylan-nobel-spark-notes-plagarism/530283/ |archive-date=April 3, 2021 |access-date=February 20, 2025 |work=The Atlantic}}{{Cite news |last=Haynes |first=Gavin |date=June 14, 2017 |title=It's alright ma, I'm only cheating: did Bob Dylan crib his Nobel speech from SparkNotes? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/shortcuts/2017/jun/14/its-alright-ma-im-only-cheating-did-bob-dylan-crib-his-nobel-speech-from-sparknotes |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20171221143331/https://www.theguardian.com/music/shortcuts/2017/jun/14/its-alright-ma-im-only-cheating-did-bob-dylan-crib-his-nobel-speech-from-sparknotes |archive-date=December 21, 2017 |access-date=February 20, 2025 |work=The Guardian}} The accusations prompted an article from The New York Times on the history of accusing Dylan of plagiarism, who had defended borrowing material as "a rich and enriching tradition" in folk music.{{Cite news |last=Sisario |first=Ben |author-link=Ben Sisario |date=June 14, 2017 |title=Accusations About Bob Dylan's Nobel Prize Lecture Rekindle an Old Debate |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/14/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-lecture-sparknotes.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20231108194618/https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/14/arts/music/bob-dylan-nobel-lecture-sparknotes.html |archive-date=November 8, 2023 |access-date=February 20, 2025 |work=The New York Times}}

• 13 October 2016: Announcement of the 2016 Nobel laureate in Literature by Permanent Secretary Sara Danius.

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{{Reflist}}

• [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2016/prize-announcement/ Prize Announcement] nobelprize.org
• [https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/2016/ceremony-speech/ Award Ceremony Speech] nobelprize.org

{{Nobel Prize in Literature}}

{{2016 Nobel Prize winners}}

Category:Bob Dylan

2016

Category:Plagiarism controversies

Nobel