 1935 Nobel Prize in Literature | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 "in the field of literature, produced the most outstanding work in an idealistic direction". | ||||
| Location | Stockholm, Sweden | |||
| Presented by | Swedish Academy | |||
| First awarded | 1901 | |||
| Currently held by | none | |||
| Website | Official website | |||
| ||||
The 1935 Nobel Prize in Literature was not awarded after the Swedish Academy decided that no author in the field of literature was a suitable candidate. Hence, the prize money for this year was 1⁄3 allocated to the Main Fund and 2⁄3 to the Special Fund of this prize section.
Deliberations
Nominations
Despite no author(s) being awarded for the 1935 prize, numerous literary critics, societies and academics still sent nominations to the Nobel Committee of the Swedish Academy. In total, the Nobel Committee received 52 nominations for 38 authors like Frans Eemil Sillanpää (awarded in 1939), Johannes V. Jensen (awarded in 1944), Paul Valéry, Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Roger Martin du Gard (awarded in 1937) and H. G. Wells.
Fourteen of the nominees were newly recommended for the prize such as Shaul Tchernichovsky, Miguel de Unamuno, Jules Romains, John Masefield, Elise Richter, Edvarts Virza, Víctor Manuel Rendón, Émile Mâle, James Cousins and G. K. Chesterton. There were five women nominees: Ivana Brlić-Mažuranić, Violet Clifton, Ricarda Huch, Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício and Elise Richter.
The authors Henri Barbusse, Ioan Bianu, Arthur Hoey Davis (known as Steele Rudd), Clarence Day, Ella Loraine Dorsey, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Anna Katharine Green, Kaitarō Hasegawa, Mary R. P. Hatch, Louise Manning Hodgkins, Winifred Holtby, Panait Istrati, T. E. Lawrence, James Leslie Mitchell (known as Lewis Grassic Gibbon), Violet Paget (known as Vernon Lee), Fernando Pessoa, Lizette Woodworth Reese, George William Russell, Tsubouchi Shōyō, Kurt Tucholsky, William Watson and Stanley G. Weinbaum died in 1935 without having been nominated for the prize.
| No. | Nominee | Country | Genre(s) | Nominator(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rufino Blanco Fombona (1874–1944) |  Venezuela
|
essays, literary criticism | Several professors from American universities |
| 2 | Ivana Brlić-Mažuranić (1874–1938) |  Yugoslavia
|
novel, short story | Gavro Manojlović (1856–1939) |
| 3 | G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) |  United Kingdom
|
philosophy, theology, essays, literary criticism, novel, short story, poetry | Torsten Fogelqvist (1880–1941) |
| 4 | Violet Clifton (1883–1961) | United Kingdom
|
biography, essays | Nevill Coghill (1899–1980) |
| 5 | António Correia de Oliveira (1878–1960) |  Portugal
|
poetry |
|
| 6 | James Cousins (1873–1956) |  Ireland British India
|
poetry, drama, essays, literary criticism |  Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941)
|
| 7 | Karel Čapek (1890–1938) |  Czechoslovakia
|
drama, novel, short story, essays, literary criticism |
|
| 8 | Maria Madalena de Martel Patrício (1884–1947) | Portugal
|
poetry, essays | Bento Carqueja (1860–1935) |
| 9 | Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) |  Spain
|
novel, poetry, philosophy, essays, drama | Esteban Madruga Jiménez (1890–1980) |
| 10 | Roger Martin du Gard (1881–1958) |  France
|
novel, drama, memoir |
|
| 11 | Olav Duun (1876–1939) |  Norway
|
novel, short story |
|
| 12 | James George Frazer (1854–1941) | United Kingdom
|
history, essays, translation | Jarl Charpentier (1884–1935) |
| 13 | Franz Karl Ginzkey (1871–1963) |  Austria
|
poetry, short story, essays | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 14 | Vilhelm Grønbech (1873–1948) |  Denmark
|
history, essays, poetry | Sven Lönborg (1871–1959) |
| 15 | Jarl Hemmer (1893–1944) |  Finland
|
poetry, novel | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 16 | Ricarda Huch (1864–1947) |  Germany
|
history, essays, novel, poetry | Ernst Robert Curtius (1886–1956) |
| 17 | Johannes V. Jensen (1873–1950) | Denmark
|
novel, short story, poetry |
|
| 18 | Guðmundur Kamban (1888–1945) |  Iceland
|
novel, drama | Bengt Hesselman (1875–1952) |
| 19 | Rudolf Kassner (1873–1959) | Austria
|
philosophy, essays, translation | 6 professors of the University of Zurich |
| 20 | Erwin Guido Kolbenheyer (1878–1962) |  Austria
|
novel, short story, poetry, drama | Hans-Friedrich Rosenfeld (1899–1993) |
| 21 | Sven Lönborg (1871–1959) |  Sweden
|
philosophy, history, pedagogy, essays | Emil Rodhe (1863–1936) |
| 22 | John Masefield (1878–1967) | United Kingdom
|
poetry, drama, novel, short story, essays, autobiography | Anders Österling (1884–1981) |
| 23 | Émile Mâle (1862–1954) |  France
|
history | Emil Rodhe (1863–1936) |
| 24 | Dmitry Merezhkovsky (1865–1941) |  Soviet Union
|
novel, essays, poetry, drama | Sigurd Agrell (1881–1937) |
| 25 | Eugene O'Neill (1888–1953) |  United States
|
drama | Martin Lamm (1880–1950) |
| 26 | Kostis Palamas (1859–1943) |  Greece
|
poetry, essays |
|
| 27 | Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) | India
|
philosophy, essays, law | Hjalmar Hammarskjöld (1862–1953) |
| 28 | Víctor Manuel Rendón (1859–1940) |  Ecuador
|
novel, poetry, drama, biography, essays, translation | Celiano Monge Navarrete (1856–1940) |
| 29 | Elise Richter (1865–1943) | Austria
|
philology |
|
| 30 | Jules Romains (1885–1972) | France
|
poetry, drama, screenplay | Fredrik Böök (1883–1961) |
| 31 | Frans Eemil Sillanpää (1888–1964) | Finland
|
novel, short story, poetry |
|
| 32 | Hermann Stehr (1864–1940) | Germany
|
novel, short story, poetry, drama | Hermann August Korff (1882–1963) |
| 33 | Dezső Szabó (1879–1945) |  Hungary
|
novel, essays | Björn Collinder (1894–1983) |
| 34 | Shaul Tchernichovsky (1875–1943) | Soviet Union Mandatory Palestine
|
poetry, essays, translation | Joseph Klausner (1874–1958) |
| 35 | Paul Valéry (1871–1945) | France
|
poetry, philosophy, essays, drama |
|
| 36 | Edvarts Virza (1883–1940) |  Latvia
|
poetry, essays, translation |
|
| 37 | Herbert George Wells (1866–1946) | United Kingdom
|
novel, short story, essays, history, biography | Sigfrid Siwertz (1882–1970) |
| 38 | Tadeusz Stefan Zieliński (1859–1944) |  Poland
|
philology, history, translation, essays | Several professors at the University of Warsaw |
Prize decision
In 1935, the Nobel Committee shortlisted the authors Karel Čapek, Miguel de Unamuno, John Masefield, G. K. Chesterton and Roger Martin du Gard for the Nobel Prize in Literature. During the deliberations, Čapek was dismissed for political reasons; De Unamuno, considered as one of the Spanish existentialist writers, was dismissed for his abstract ideas in his literary oeuvres; Masefield was dismissed for his uneven works; Du Gard was praised for his The Thibaults, but the committee decided to wait for its other volumes; and Chesterton, though praised by the committee for his English poems, was dismissed for "doubts over the religious non-fictional works like Saint Francis of Assisi and the biography of Jesus". Without Chesterton's religious publications, the succeeding committee members believed he could have won the Nobel for that year. With the aforementioned evaluations, it was decided that no Nobel Prize will be given in the Literature category.
Notes
- All eight were professors of history of literature at the University of Prague, Czechoslovakia.
- Three professors of literature and/or history from the University of Athens, Greece.
- Nobel committee member Per Hallström, being a supporter of Nazism at the time, thought Karl Čapek's writings against anti-semitism and the Nazi movement was "unacceptable and unwelcoming". Hallström then convinced his fellow committee members to not award him and any other writers against Adolf Hitler.
References
- "Why was no Nobel Prize for Literature awarded in 1935?". history.stackexchange.com. Retrieved 1 April 2023.
- The Nobel Prize in Literature 1935 nobelprize.org
- ^ Nomination archive – Literature 1935 nobelprize.org
- ^ The Nobel Prize in Literature: Nominations and Reports 1901–1950 nobelprize.org
- Gustav Källstrand Andens Olympiska Spel: Nobelprisets historia, Fri Tanke 2021
