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1972 Nobel Prize in Literature
Heinrich Böll
"for his writing which through its combination of a broad perspective on his time and a sensitive skill in characterization has contributed to a renewal of German literature."
Date	19 October 1972 (1972-10-19) (announcement) 10 December 1972 (ceremony)
Location	Stockholm, Sweden
Presented by	Swedish Academy
First awarded	1901
Website	Official website
← 1971 · Nobel Prize in Literature · 1973 →

The 1972 Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to the German author Heinrich Böll (1917–1985) "for his writing which through its combination of a broad perspective on his time and a sensitive skill in characterization has contributed to a renewal of German literature." Böll is the fifth German author to be recipient of the prize.

Laureate

The events of World War II had a significant influence on Heinrich Böll's literature. In his debut novel Der Zug war pünktlich ("The Train Was on Time", 1949) and the short story collection Wanderer, kommst du nach Spa... ("Stranger, Bear Word to the Spartans We...", 1950), he illustrated the folly of war and the pain it causes. Böll published a number of books that critiqued West German society after World War II, such as Gruppenbild mit Dame ("Group Portrait with Lady", 1971). Among his best-known works include Und sagte kein einziges Wort ("And Never Said a Word", 1953), Ansichten eines Clowns ("The Clowns", 1963), and Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum ("The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum", 1974).

Deliberations

Nominations

In 1972, the Swedish Academy received nominations for 100 writers. Böll started earning nominations for the Nobel Prize in Literature since 1960. In total, he received 29 nominations with the highest number in 1972 which eventually led to his awarding.

Twenty-seven authors were newly nominated such as Philip Roth, Norman Mailer, Bernard Malamud, Nadine Gordimer (awarded in 1991), V. S. Naipaul (awarded in 2001), Francis Stuart, Doris Lessing (awarded in 2007), Alan Paton, Astrid Lindgren, Anthony Burgess, and Sri Chinmoy. The most number of nominations was for the British-American poet W. H. Auden with 10 nominations. The oldest nominee was Compton Mackenzie (aged 89) and the youngest was Philip Roth (aged 39). The Polish-born American poet Jacob Glatstein and Indian novelist Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay were nominated posthumously by Moshe Starkman (1906–1975) and the Academy's Nobel Committee respectively. Five of the nominees were women namely Nadine Gordimer, Doris Lessing, Astrid Lindgren, Anna Seghers, and Marie Under.

The authors Natalie Clifford Barney, John Berryman, Victor Bridges, Fredric Brown, Américo Castro, Michał Choromański, Richard Church, Cecil Day-Lewis, R. F. Delderfield, Jacques Deval, Robert Faesi, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Ernestine Hill, Helen Hoyt, Vera Inber, Norah Lange, Violette Leduc, Laurence Manning, José Nucete Sardi, Kenneth Patchen, Betty Smith, Edgar Snow, Violet Trefusis, Mark Van Doren, and Ivan Yefremov died in 1972 without having been nominated for the prize.

Official list of nominees and their nominators for the prize

No.	Nominee	Country	Genre(s)	Nominator(s)
1	Said Akl (1911–2014)	Lebanon	poetry, philosophy, drama	Association of Cultural Clubs in Lebanon
2	Tawfiq al-Hakim (1898–1987)	Egypt	novel, drama, essays, short story, biography	Ibrāhīm Madkūr (1902–1995) Ḥusnī Farīz (1907–1990)
3	Edward Albee (1928–2016)	United States	drama	Dieter Schaller (1929–2003)
4	Jorge Amado (1912–2001)	Brazil	novel, short story	Marcos Almir Madeira (1916–2003)
5	Louis Aragon (1897–1982)	France	novel, short story, poetry, essays	Jean Gaudon (1926–2019)
6	Wystan Hugh Auden (1907–1973)	United Kingdom  United States	poetry, essays, screenplay	Hans Bielenstein (1920–2015) Thomas Fleming (1927–2017) Charles Bracelen Flood (1930–2014) Paul Goestch (1934–2018) Richard M. Goodwin (1913–1996) Samuel Johnson (1919–2005) Jónas Kristjánsson (1924–2014) Victor Sawdon Pritchett (1900–1997) Denis de Rougemont (1906–1985) Walter Weiss (born 1942)
7	Riccardo Bacchelli (1891–1985)	Italy	novel, drama, essays	Beniamino Segre (1903–1977)
8	Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay (1898–1971) (posthumous nomination)	India	novel, short story, drama, essays, autobiography, songwriting	Nobel Committee
9	Saul Bellow (1915–2005)	Canada  United States	novel, short story, memoir, essays	Elsie Patton (?)
10	Louis Paul Boon (1912–1979)	Belgium	novel, essays, short story, poetry	Renaat Declerck (born 1949) Carel Jules Emile Dinaux (1898–1980)
11	Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986)	Argentina	poetry, essays, translation, short story	Kurt Leopold Levy (1917–2000) Raimundo Lida (1908–1979)
12	Luis Buñuel (1900–1983)	Spain	screenplay	Lars Forssell (1928–2007)
13	Anthony Burgess (1917–1993)	United Kingdom	novel, poetry, drama, screenplay, autobiography, biography, essays, literary criticism, translation	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
14	Heinrich Böll (1917–1985)	West Germany	novel, short story	Manfred Durzak (born 1938) Karl Hyldgaard-Jensen (1917–1995) Gustav Korlén (1915–2014) Hans Mayer (1907–2001) Gerhard Nickel (1928–2015) Marcel Reich-Ranicki (1920–2013) Herbert Morgan Waidson (1916–1988) Leevi Valkama (1915–2000)
15	Michel Butor (1926–2016)	France	poetry, novel, essays, translation	Leon Samuel Roudiez (1917–2004)
16	Elias Canetti (1905–1994)	Bulgaria  United Kingdom	novel, drama, memoir, essays	Keith Spalding (1913–2002)
17	Aimé Césaire (1913–2008)	Martinique	poetry, drama, essays	Lassi Nummi (1928–2012)
18	André Chamson (1900–1983)	France	novel, essays	Giannēs Koutsocheras (1904–1994) Yves Gandon (1899–1975) Armand Lunel (1892–1977) Jean Mistler (1897–1988) Charles Rostaing (1904–1999)
19	René Char (1907–1988)	France	poetry	Henri Peyre (1901–1988)
20	Suniti Kumar Chatterji (1890–1977)	India	essays, pedagogy, literary criticism	Pratul Chandra Gupta (1910–1990)
21	Sri Chinmoy (1931–2007)	India  United States	poetry, drama, short story, essays, songwriting	Bernard O'Kelly (1927–2005) Norman Holmes Pearson (1909–1975)
22	Austin Clarke (1896–1974)	Ireland	poetry, drama, novel, memoirs	Kenneth Deale (1907–1974) Desmond Clarke (1907–1979)
23	Fazıl Hüsnü Dağlarca (1914–2008)	Turkey	poetry	Yaşar Nabi Nayır (1908–1981)
24	Denis de Rougemont (1906–1985)	Switzerland	philosophy, essays	Suzanne Deriex (born 1926)
25	Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)	Switzerland	drama, novel, short story, essays	Werner Betz (1912–1980) Herbert Penzl (1910–1995) Kasimir Geza Werner (1900–1985) Elisabet Hermodsson (1927–2017)
26	Odysseas Elytis (1911–1996)	Greece	poetry, essays, translation	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
27	Rabbe Enckell (1903–1974)	Finland	short story, poetry	Eeva Kilpi (born 1928) Carl-Eric Thors (1920–1986)
28	Salvador Espriu (1913–1985)	Spain	drama, novel, poetry	Antoni Comas i Pujol (1931–1981)
29	Max Frisch (1911–1991)	Switzerland	novel, drama	Elisabet Hermodsson (1927–2017)
30	Romain Gary (1914–1980)	Lithuania  France	novel, essays, literary criticism, screenplay	Walther Hinz (1906–1992)
31	Jacob Glatstein (1896–1971) (posthumous nomination)	Poland  United States	poetry, essays, literary criticism	Moshe Starkman (1906–1975)
32	William Golding (1911–1993)	United Kingdom	novel, poetry, drama, essays	Nobel Committee
33	Nadine Gordimer (1923–2014)	South Africa	novel, short story, essay, drama	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
34	Julien Gracq (1910–2007)	France	novel, drama, poetry, essays	Georges Matoré (1908–1998)
35	Günter Grass (1927–2015)	West Germany	novel, drama, poetry, essays	Henry Caraway Hatfield (1912–1995) Emil Ernst Ploss (1925–1972) Manfred Windfuhr (born 1930)
36	Julien Green (1900–1998)	France	novel, autobiography, essays	Johannes Edfelt (1904–1997)
37	Graham Greene (1904–1991)	United Kingdom	novel, short story, autobiography, essays	Heinrich Böll (1917–1985) Mary Renault (1905–1983)
38	Paavo Haavikko (1931–2008)	Finland	poetry, drama, essays	Lassi Nummi (1928–2012)
39	William Heinesen (1900–1991)	Faroe Islands	poetry, short story, novel	Harald Noreng (1913–2006)
40	Joseph Heller (1923–1999)	United States	novel, short story, drama, screenplay	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
41	Vladimír Holan (1905–1980)	Czechoslovakia	poetry, essays	Nobel Committee
42	Taha Hussein (1889–1973)	Egypt	novel, short story, poetry, translation	Ibrāhīm Madkūr (1902–1995)
43	Gyula Illyés (1902–1983)	Hungary	poetry, novel, drama, essays	Lars Gyllensten (1921–2006) Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
44	Eugène Ionesco (1909–1994)	Romania  France	drama, essays	Johannes Söderlind (1918–2001)
45	Roman Jakobson (1896–1982)	Russia  United States	essays	Jean Dubois (1920–2015)
46	Eyvind Johnson (1900–1976)	Sweden	novel, short story	Pär Lagerkvist (1891–1974)
47	Ferenc Juhász (1928–2015)	Hungary	poetry	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
48	Erich Kästner (1899–1974)	West Germany	poetry, screenplay, autobiography	Johann Maier (1933–2019)
49	Miroslav Krleža (1893–1981)	Croatia  Yugoslavia	poetry, drama, short story, novel, essays	Nobel Committee
50	Manbohdan Lal (?)	India		Udai Narain Tewari (?)
51	Philip Larkin (1922–1985)	United Kingdom	poetry, novel, essays	Jørgen Læssøe (1924–1993)
52	Siegfried Lenz (1926–2014)	West Germany	novel, short story, essays, drama	Nobel Committee
53	Doris Lessing (1919–2013)	United Kingdom	novel, short story, memoirs, drama, poetry, essays	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
54	Saunders Lewis (1893–1985)	United Kingdom	poetry, essays, history, literary criticism	John Ellis Caerwyn Williams (1912–1999)
55	Lin Yutang (1895–1976)	China	novel, philosophy, essays, translation	Peng Yao (?)
56	Astrid Lindgren (1907–2002)	Sweden	novel, short story, drama, screenplay	Klaud Doderer (born 1925) Josef Stummvoll (1902–1982)
57	Väinö Linna (1920–1992)	Finland	novel	Eeva Kilpi (born 1928) A. Sakari (?)
58	Stanislaus Lynch (1907–1983)	Ireland	poetry, essays	Desmond Clarke (1907–1979)
59	Compton Mackenzie (1883–1972)	United Kingdom	novel, short story, drama, poetry, history, biography, essays, literary criticism, memoirs	Norman Jeffares (1920–2005)
60	Hugh MacLennan (1907–1990)	Canada	novel, essays	Lawrence Lande (1906–1998)
61	Harold Macmillan (1894–1986)	United Kingdom	history, essays, memoirs	Carl Becker (1925–1973)
62	Norman Mailer (1923–2007)	United States	novel, short story, poetry, essays, biography, drama, screenplay	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
63	Bernard Malamud (1914–1986)	United States	novel, short story	Lars Gyllensten (1921–2006)
64	André Malraux (1901–1976)	France	novel, essays, literary criticism	Lloyd James Austin (1915–1994) Jean Guéhenno (1890–1978) Jan Kott (1914–2001) Jac Mey (?) John Henry Raleigh (1920–2001) Laurent Versini (1932–2021)
65	Frederick Manfred (1912–1994)	United States	novel, essays	Wayne Shafer Knutson (born 1926) John J. Timmerman (1908–2004)
66	Gabriel Marcel (1889–1973)	France	philosophy, drama	Charles Dédéyan (1910–2003)
67	Gustave Lucien Martin-Saint-René (1888–1973)	France	poetry, novel, essays, literary criticism, drama, songwriting, short story	Henri Guiter (1909–1994)
68	Harry Martinson (1904–1978)	Sweden	poetry, novel, drama, essays	Pär Lagerkvist (1891–1974)
69	László Mécs (1895–1978)	Hungary	poetry, essays	Watson Kirkconnell (1895–1977)
70	Veijo Meri (1928–2015)	Finland	novel, short story, poetry, essays	Osmo Hormia (1926–1983)
71	Vilhelm Moberg (1898–1973)	Sweden	novel, drama, history	Harald Noreng (1913–2006)
72	Eugenio Montale (1896–1981)	Italy	poetry, translation	Carlo Bo (1911–2001) Lanfranco Caretti (1915–1995) Uberto Limentani (1913–1989)
73	Alberto Moravia (1907–1990)	Italy	novel, literary criticism, essays, drama	Jacques Robichez (1914–1999)
74	Sławomir Mrożek (1930–2013)	Poland	drama, essays	Kauko Aatos Ojala (1919–1987)
75	Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (1932–2018)	Trinidad and Tobago  United Kingdom	novel, short story, essays	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
76	Mikhail Naimy (1889–1988)	Lebanon	poetry, drama, short story, novel, autobiography, literary criticism	Joseph Bassila (?)
77	Pak Dujin (1916–1998)	South Korea	poetry	Baek Cheol (1908–1985)
78	Alan Paton (1903–1988)	South Africa	novel, autobiography, essays	Astley Cooper Partridge (1901–?)
79	José María Pemán (1897–1981)	Spain	poetry, drama, novel, essays, screenplay	Juan de Contreras y López de Ayala (1893–1978)
80	Ezra Pound (1885–1972)	United States	poetry, essays	Hans Galinsky (1909–1991)
81	Pandelis Prevelakis (1909–1986)	Greece	novel, poetry, drama, essays	Kariophilēs Mētsakēs (1932–2013)
82	Henri Queffélec (1910–1992)	France	novel, short story, screenplay	Edmond Jarno (1905–1985)
83	Evaristo Ribera Chevremont (1890–1976)	Puerto Rico	poetry	Washington Lloréns (1899–1989) Ernesto Juan Fonfrias (1909–1990)
84	Yannis Ritsos (1909–1990)	Greece	poetry, songwriting	Per Wästberg (born 1933)
85	Philip Roth (1933–2018)	United States	novel, short story, memoirs, essays	Artur Lundkvist (1906–1991)
86	Georges Schéhadé (1905–1989)	Lebanon	poetry, drama, novel	Joseph Bassila (?) Camille Aboussouan (1919–2013) Fouad Boustany (1904–1994)
87	Arno Schmidt (1914–1979)	West Germany	novel, short story, biography, essays	Nobel Committee
88	Anna Seghers (1900–1983)	East Germany	novel, short story	Heinz Kamnitzer (1917–2001) Volker Klotz (1930–2023)
89	Léopold Sédar Senghor (1906–2001)	Senegal	poetry, essays	Lassi Nummi (1928–2012)
90	Claude Simon (1913–2005)	France	novel, essays	Nobel Committee
91	Zaharia Stancu (1902–1974)	Romania	poetry, novel, philosophy, essays	Miguel Ángel Asturias (1899–1974) Victor Eftimiu (1889–1972)
92	Francis Stuart (1902–2000)	Ireland	novel, short story, poetry, essays	Desmond Clarke (1907–1979)
93	Abraham Sutzkever (1913–2010)	Belarus  Israel	poetry	Joseph Leftwich (1892–1984)
94	Marie Under (1883–1980)	Estonia	poetry	Lassi Nummi (1928–2012)
95	Gerard Walschap (1898–1989)	Belgium	novel, drama, essays	Maurice Gilliams (1900–1982) Willem Pée (1903–1986)
96	Patrick White (1912–1990)	Australia	novel, short story, drama, poetry, autobiography	Muriel Clara Bradbrook (1909–1993) Leslie Rees (1905–2000) Harold Leslie Rogers (1925–1990) Eila Pennanen (1916–1994)
97	Elie Wiesel (1928–2016)	Romania  United States	novel, memoirs, essays, drama	André Neher (1914–1988)
98	Thornton Wilder (1897–1975)	United States	drama, novel, short story	Wolfgang Clemen (1909–1990)
99	Vũ Hoàng Chương (1915–1976)	South Vietnam	poetry, drama	Thanh Lãng (1924–1978)
100	Aaron Zeitlin (1898–1973)	Belarus  Israel	drama, short story, essays, literary criticism	Moshe Starkman (1906–1975)

Prize decision

Heinrich Böll had been considered for the prize by the Nobel committee since the first time he was nominated in 1960. The publication of Gruppenbild mit Dame in 1971, a year when Böll was not nominated for the prize, is believed to have strengthened his candidacy, and in 1972 the Nobel committee proposed that Böll should be awarded the prize. The other final candidates were Günter Grass, Eugenio Montale and Patrick White. A shared prize between Böll and Grass was proposed but rejected by the committee.

Nobel lecture

Böll delivered a Nobel lecture entitled An Essay on the Reason of Poetry on May 2, 1973 at the Swedish Academy. In his lecture, he said:

"Art is always a good hiding-place, not for dynamite, but for intellectual explosives and social time bombs. Why would there otherwise have been the various Indices? And precisely in their despised and often even despicable beauty and lack of transparency lies the best hiding-place for the barb that brings about the sudden jerk or the sudden recognition."

Notes

1. Heinrich Böll is the first German citizen to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature since Thomas Mann won it in 1929. Hermann Hesse, born in Germany, was a Swiss citizen when he won the prize in 1946. The late poet Nelly Sachs, who was born in Germany and wrote in German, was honored in 1966, but she was a Swedish subject.

References

1. "Nobel Prize in Literature 1972". nobelprize.org.
2. ^ "Heinrich Boll Wins Nobel for Literature". The New York Times. 20 October 1972. Retrieved 21 May 2021.
3. Heinrich Böll – Facts nobelprize.org
4. Heinrich Böll britannica.com
5. Nomination archive – Heinrich Böll nobelprize.org
6. Nomination archive – 1972 nobelprize.org
7. "Nobelarkivet-1972" (PDF). svenskaakademien.se. April 2020. Retrieved 2 January 2023.
8. Kaj Schueler (2 January 2023). "Nobelpristagaren ansågs stödja terroristerna". Svenska Dagbladet (in Swedish).
9. ^ 1972 Nobel lecture nobelprize.org

External links

• Award Ceremony speech by Karl Ragnar Gierow nobelprize.org
• Press release nobelprize.org
• Nobel diploma nobelprize.org

v t e Laureates of the Nobel Prize in Literature
1901–1920	1901: Sully Prudhomme 1902: Theodor Mommsen 1903: Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson 1904: Frédéric Mistral / José Echegaray 1905: Henryk Sienkiewicz 1906: Giosuè Carducci 1907: Rudyard Kipling 1908: Rudolf Eucken 1909: Selma Lagerlöf 1910: Paul Heyse 1911: Maurice Maeterlinck 1912: Gerhart Hauptmann 1913: Rabindranath Tagore 1914 1915: Romain Rolland 1916: Verner von Heidenstam 1917: Karl Gjellerup / Henrik Pontoppidan 1918 1919: Carl Spitteler 1920: Knut Hamsun
1921–1940	1921: Anatole France 1922: Jacinto Benavente 1923: W. B. Yeats 1924: Władysław Reymont 1925: George Bernard Shaw 1926: Grazia Deledda 1927: Henri Bergson 1928: Sigrid Undset 1929: Thomas Mann 1930: Sinclair Lewis 1931: Erik Axel Karlfeldt (posthumously) 1932: John Galsworthy 1933: Ivan Bunin 1934: Luigi Pirandello 1935 1936: Eugene O'Neill 1937: Roger Martin du Gard 1938: Pearl S. Buck 1939: Frans Eemil Sillanpää 1940
1941–1960	1941 1942 1943 1944: Johannes V. Jensen 1945: Gabriela Mistral 1946: Hermann Hesse 1947: André Gide 1948: T. S. Eliot 1949: William Faulkner 1950: Bertrand Russell 1951: Pär Lagerkvist 1952: François Mauriac 1953: Winston Churchill 1954: Ernest Hemingway 1955: Halldór Laxness 1956: Juan Ramón Jiménez 1957: Albert Camus 1958: Boris Pasternak 1959: Salvatore Quasimodo 1960: Saint-John Perse
1961–1980	1961: Ivo Andrić 1962: John Steinbeck 1963: Giorgos Seferis 1964: Jean-Paul Sartre (declined award) 1965: Mikhail Sholokhov 1966: Shmuel Yosef Agnon / Nelly Sachs 1967: Miguel Ángel Asturias 1968: Yasunari Kawabata 1969: Samuel Beckett 1970: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1971: Pablo Neruda 1972: Heinrich Böll 1973: Patrick White 1974: Eyvind Johnson / Harry Martinson 1975: Eugenio Montale 1976: Saul Bellow 1977: Vicente Aleixandre 1978: Isaac Bashevis Singer 1979: Odysseas Elytis 1980: Czesław Miłosz
1981–2000	1981: Elias Canetti 1982: Gabriel García Márquez 1983: William Golding 1984: Jaroslav Seifert 1985: Claude Simon 1986: Wole Soyinka 1987: Joseph Brodsky 1988: Naguib Mahfouz 1989: Camilo José Cela 1990: Octavio Paz 1991: Nadine Gordimer 1992: Derek Walcott 1993: Toni Morrison 1994: Kenzaburō Ōe 1995: Seamus Heaney 1996: Wisława Szymborska 1997: Dario Fo 1998: José Saramago 1999: Günter Grass 2000: Gao Xingjian
2001–2020	2001: V. S. Naipaul 2002: Imre Kertész 2003: J. M. Coetzee 2004: Elfriede Jelinek 2005: Harold Pinter 2006: Orhan Pamuk 2007: Doris Lessing 2008: J. M. G. Le Clézio 2009: Herta Müller 2010: Mario Vargas Llosa 2011: Tomas Tranströmer 2012: Mo Yan 2013: Alice Munro 2014: Patrick Modiano 2015: Svetlana Alexievich 2016: Bob Dylan 2017: Kazuo Ishiguro 2018: Olga Tokarczuk 2019: Peter Handke 2020: Louise Glück
2021–present	2021: Abdulrazak Gurnah 2022: Annie Ernaux 2023: Jon Fosse 2024: Han Kang

• Nobel Prize in Literature by year
• Heinrich Böll
• 1972 literary awards