Leo Tolstoy (1902–1906)
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Story Nobel Prize in literature began in 1901 - and immediately with a scandal. Its first laureate was the French poet Sully-Prudhomme. Forty-two Swedish critics and writers - including future Nobel laureates Selma Lagerlöf and Werner von Heydenstam - were dumbfounded: the main author in the world, in their opinion, was Leo Tolstoy. August Strindberg launched into a long-winded article, calling academics unscrupulous artisans and amateurs in literature. Tolstoy himself received, the authors of which called him “the most revered patriarch modern literature” and justified themselves: the committee’s choice, they say, does not reflect the opinions of either critics or readers. In response to Oscar Levertin, one of the forty-two authors, Tolstoy said: “I was very pleased that the Nobel Prize was not awarded to me.<…>this saved me from a great difficulty in disposing of this money, which, like any money, in my conviction, can only bring evil.”
A piquant detail: among the twenty-three contenders for the first prize, Tolstoy was not present at all. But now - mainly through the efforts of French academicians - the count was nominated every year. However, he never received the prize, not least because of the unflattering description that Alfred Jensen, an expert on Slavic literature, wrote for the committee. Jensen's philosophy of the late Tolstoy is destructive and contrary to the idealistic nature of the prize. Later, however, the researcher spoke more flatteringly about Tolstoy - but he still was not offended. In 1906, the writer even of his Swedish colleagues “tried to ensure that I was not awarded this prize,” because “if this happened, it would be very unpleasant for me to refuse.” The committee listened and was relieved to stop putting him on the list.
Dmitry Merezhkovsky (1914, 1915, 1930–1937)
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After Tolstoy's death, the most famous Russian novelist in Europe became Dmitry Merezhkovsky, whose candidacy was proposed in 1914 by the first director of the Pushkin House, Nestor Kotlyarevsky. The committee again turned to Alfred Jensen for feedback: the philologist noted the kinship of his work with the works of Nadson, Pushkin and Baudelaire and generally praised the candidate “for his artistic mastery of depiction, universal content and idealistic direction.” However, history intervened in the matter: the First World War broke out - and they decided not to award the prize.
The following year, Merezhkovsky was nominated by a Swedish writer, at whose suggestion Selma Lagerlöf had already received the award. In his new review, Jensen was merciless towards Merezhkovsky, calling him “a collector of details, quotes and simply copied pages” and pointing out that he was far from real masters like Leo Tolstoy; an astonishing judgment, considering that he had previously criticized Tolstoy. However, when the author of “At the Lower Depths” and “Mother” first appeared among the nominees, Jensen again changed his position, complaining that “Maxim Gorky was included in the 1918 list of Russian writers, while the name of Merezhkovsky does not appear,” and that Merezhkovsky's legacy "will forever preserve his name regardless of the Nobel Prize."
Low competition could have played into Merezhkovsky’s hands: warring Europe had no time for literature. But in February, the committee added thirteen more names left over from last year to the eleven applicants. The laureate then became Romain Rolland, who later himself became three Russian authors - Maxim Gorky, Ivan Bunin and Konstantin Balmont.
Merezhkovsky again began to compete for the prize only fifteen years later. The poet and translator Sigurd Agrel nominated it for seven years in a row - sometimes alone, sometimes in company with Bunin and Gorky. Merezhkovsky was considered by many to be the favorite (feuilletonist Alexander Amfitheatrov even rushed to congratulate him on receiving the Nobel Prize), but the writer himself did not overestimate his chances. Vera Bunina, as Merezhkovsky busily suggested that Bunin share the prize: if one of them wins, he will give the second 200,000 francs. Bunin refused with contempt, and in 1933 he received it - solo. Merezhkovsky, however, did not give up trying - he made connections, wrote letters, became friends with Gustav Nobel, Alfred's nephew - but in vain: he never received the award.
Maxim Gorky (1918, 1923, 1928, 1933)
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Maxim Gorky was not nominated for the Nobel Prize as often as some - only four times. But he received nominations with mathematical precision: once every five years and always in the year of his next anniversary.
Gorky presented a problem for the Nobel Committee. On the one hand, it was impossible to ignore a talent of such magnitude; on the other hand, the Swedes were embarrassed by his political views. The same Jensen in 1918, when the fifty-year-old Gorky was nominated for the first time, praised early works writer and - later: “anarchist and often completely crude creations” of Gorky “in no way fit into the framework of the Nobel Prize.” However, the award was not presented that time again.
Five years later, Jensen’s successor Anton Karlgren added new accusations: in Gorky’s work after 1905, in his opinion, there is “not the slightest echo of ardent love for the homeland,” and in general his books are a complete “sterile desert.” The committee also agreed with him, preferring Gorky (and at the same time Bunin) to the Irishman William Butler Yeats.
In 1928, two Swedish writers vouched for the “petrel of the revolution” - Werner von Heydenstam and Thor Hedberg. Nobel Committee was impressed by the persistence of the fans of the Russian author, and Gorky was even considered a favorite, but the prize was won by the Norwegian novelist Sigrid Undset.
Finally, in 1933, Sigurd Agrel nominated Gorky. According to him, the prize should either be awarded to Bunin, or divided between him and Merezhkovsky (the latter would have liked this option), or divided between Bunin and Gorky. The committee gave preference to the author of “The Life of Arsenyev”. Gorky died in 1936, without waiting for another nomination.
Vladimir Nabokov (1963–…)
© Horst Tappe/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Back in the 1930s, when Bunin, Gorky and Merezhkovsky were fighting for the prize, Vera Bunina wrote in her diary: “I read Sirina. How light it is and how modern it is. This is who will soon be a candidate for the Nobel Prize.” The prediction almost came true: Nabokov received his first nomination only in 1963. By this point he had already become one of the best novelists of the century, but one of his books still embarrassed the academy: “The author of the immoral and successful novel Lolita cannot under any circumstances be considered as a candidate for the prize,” wrote a permanent member of the Swedish Academy Anders Oesterling.
For at least three years in a row, Nabokov was among the nominees, but lost. In 1964, the prize was awarded to Sartre (the Frenchman refused it), and in 1965, to Nabokov’s former compatriot Sholokhov. Most likely, Nabokov was nominated later (we will find out about this when the archives are opened). In a May 1969 review of Ada, New York Times critic John Leonard wrote, "If he doesn't win the Nobel Prize, it will be because it's unworthy of him."
In 1970, Alexander Solzhenitsyn became the laureate. Nabokov was not enthusiastic about the author of The Gulag Archipelago, as well as Brodsky, but he never criticized them in the press and spoke with reserved respect. He responded that Nabokov had left his native language, but recognized in him “a dazzling literary talent, exactly what we call genius,” and publicly asked the Nobel Committee to finally pay tribute to the Russian-American writer.
When Solzhenitsyn was deprived of citizenship and expelled from the USSR in February 1974, Nabokov immediately wrote to him, thanked him for his support and invited him to see him. In the fall, Solzhenitsyn arrived in the Swiss city of Montreux, where Nabokov and his wife lived, and received a note inviting him to meet. Without answering anything, Nabokov immediately ordered a separate office in the restaurant and went there to wait for Solzhenitsyn. The same one was in the dark and spent the entire morning of October 6 calling Nabokov’s empty room, not daring to go into the restaurant. According to culturologist Boris Paramonov, Nabokov deliberately “avoided meeting Solzhenitsyn,” but, apparently, the non-meeting was the result of an absurd accident. Nabokov himself believed that it was Solzhenitsyn who changed his mind about getting to know him. “I probably seem too verbal to him, carelessly apolitical,” he complained to Bella Akhmadulina. The two main Russian emigrant writers never crossed paths. The first couple were Miguel Angel Asturias and Jorge Louis Borges: Asturias became a laureate in 1967, while the Argentine prose writer inappropriately became friends with Pinochet and thereby deprived himself of a chance for a Nobel Prize. Shmuel Yosef Agnon and Nelly Sachs shared the prize for the following year. Well, the third option was the parallel awarding of Mikhail Sholokhov and Anna Akhmatova. Committee Chairman Anders Oesterling, however, considered this move too compromising and insisted that the prize go into one person's hands. It was received by Sholokhov, who was nominated for the seventh time. A year later, Akhmatova died, and this nomination remained her only one.
MOSCOW, October 13 - RIA Novosti. The Nobel Committee on Thursday awarded the 2016 Literature Prize to Bob Dylan. Last year the prize was awarded to the Belarusian writer Svetlana Alexievich, although Haruki Murakami was considered the favorite. This year, bookmakers predicted him to win again, but the choice of the Nobel Committee is unpredictable. RIA Novosti looked at which of the writers who were certainly worthy of the prize never received it.
Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature for several years in a row - from 1902 to 1906. Although his ideas and works were popular in the world, the writer did not receive a prize. Secretary of the Swedish Academy Karl Wirsen said that Tolstoy “condemned all forms of civilization and insisted in their place on adopting a primitive way of life, divorced from all the institutions of high culture.” Tolstoy later wrote a letter in which he asked not to be awarded the Nobel Prize.
On October 8, 1906, Leo Tolstoy refused the Nobel Prize. It's actually not that surprising. After all, Leo Tolstoy was a man of principles. He had a negative attitude towards various monetary rewards. Throughout the history of the Nobel Prize, great people have refused it more than once, but more often they were forced to refuse than they refused because of their convictions. Today we decided to talk about seven laureates who refused the Nobel Prize.
The Nobel Prize is one of the most prestigious international prizes, awarded annually for outstanding scientific research, revolutionary inventions or major contributions to culture or society. Many people have long considered it a great honor to receive such an award, but not everyone.
Leo Tolstoy
The great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, having learned that Russian Academy Sciences nominated him as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature, he fervently asked in a letter to his friend the Finnish writer and translator Arvid Järnefelt to ensure that the prize was not awarded to him. The fact is that Leo Tolstoy himself was categorically convinced that the Nobel Prize is, first of all, money. And he considered money a great evil.
Jean-Paul Sartre
Not only Leo Tolstoy voluntarily refused the Nobel Prize. Writer Jean-Paul Sartre, winner in 1964, also refused the award due to his beliefs. To all the questions that were put to him on this subject, he answered quite clearly that in the current situation the Nobel Prize is in fact an award intended for writers of the West or "rebels" from the East. Sartre believed that only certain types of writers receive the prize; those talented and prize-worthy writers who do not fit the category will never receive the prize.
Boris Pasternak
Boris Pasternak in his life became a worthy winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1958. However, Pasternak was forced to refuse the award under intense pressure from the Soviet authorities. The prize was awarded to Pasternak “for outstanding achievements in modern lyric poetry and in the field of great Russian prose.” But the Soviet authorities did not allow Pasternak to receive the prize because of his novel Doctor Zhivago, which was published abroad. The USSR considered the novel “ideologically harmful.”
Richard Kuhn
In 1937, Adolf Hitler banned German citizens from receiving Nobel Prizes because he was offended that the Swedish committee's award had been given to Nazi critic Carl von Ossietzky. Richard Kuhn, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1938, was due to receive this award for his work on carotenoids and vitamins, but was eventually forced to refuse the prize due to Hitler's fundamental ban on German citizens receiving Nobel Prizes.
Adolf Butenandt
Another German chemist, who was a Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry together with the Swiss scientist L. Ruzicka, was forced to refuse it in the same way as Richard Kuhn due to Hitler's ban on German citizens receiving the Nobel Prize. However, it is known that Butenandt’s research on the biochemistry of hormonal substances in insects was awarded a prize to them. P. Ehrlich.
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From the history of the greats scientific discoveries: Adolf Friedrich Johann Butenandt
Gerhard Domagk
Gerhard Domagk was an outstanding German pathologist and bacteriologist. He won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1939 “for his discovery of the antibacterial effect of prontosil.” He became the third person on the list who was forced to refuse the award due to the ban of Adolf Hitler.
107 years ago, Leo Tolstoy refused the Nobel Prize. Then his step was repeated - deliberately or forcedly - by eight more people. The ninth refused the mathematical analogue of the Nobel Prize. We have collected these stories.
Money is evil
Having learned that the Russian Academy of Sciences nominated him as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature, Leo Tolstoy on October 7, 1906, in a letter to his friend, Finnish writer and translator Arvid Järnefelt, asked that the prize not be awarded to him.
“If this happened, I would be very unpleasant to refuse,” wrote the author of War and Peace. Järnefelt complied with the request and the prize was awarded to the Italian poet Giosue Carducci. As a result, everyone was happy: both Carducci and Tolstoy. The latter wrote: “This saved me from great difficulty in disposing of this money, which, like all money, in my opinion, can only bring evil; and secondly, it gave me the honor and great pleasure to receive expressions of sympathy from so many people.” , although not familiar to me, but still deeply respected by me."
Hitler vs Nobel
Offended by the fact that the Swedish committee's award was given to Nazi critic Carl von Ossietzky, Adolf Hitler banned German citizens from receiving Nobel Prizes in 1937. As a result, chemists Richard Kuhn, Adolf Butenandt and physiologist Gerhard Domagk, who became Nobel laureates in 1938 and 1939, were unable to attend the award ceremony. The medals were awarded to scientists after the end of World War II, and the money remained in the Nobel Foundation.
Poet and citizen
The winner of the 1958 Nobel Prize in Literature, Boris Pasternak, was forced to refuse the award under unprecedented pressure from the Soviet authorities.
The prize was awarded to Pasternak with the wording “for outstanding achievements in modern lyric poetry and in the field of great Russian prose.” The CPSU Central Committee considered that the reason for the award was Pasternak's novel Doctor Zhivago, published abroad, which was recognized as ideologically harmful in the USSR.
For a week, the writer endured insults, personal threats and persecution in the press, but when his beloved Olga Ivinskaya was fired from her job, Boris Pasternak sent a telegram to Stockholm: “Because of the significance that the award awarded to me has received in the society to which I belong, I must refuse it, do not take my voluntary refusal as an insult.” And another one to the Central Committee: “I refused the prize, return Ivinskaya’s job.”
The Nobel Committee considered the refusal forced, and in 1989 the diploma and medal were awarded to the writer’s son.
Principles above
Another writer who refused the Nobel Prize for the sake of his beliefs was Jean-Paul Sartre, winner in 1964. In a statement to journalists, he said: "In the current climate, the Nobel Prize is in fact an award reserved for writers of the West or "rebels" from the East. For example, Neruda, one of the greatest poets South America. Aragon's candidacy was never seriously discussed, although he is well deserving of the prize.
It is regrettable that the Nobel Prize was awarded to Pasternak, not Sholokhov, and that the only Soviet work to receive the prize was a book published abroad and banned in home country. Balance could be restored with a similar gesture, but with the opposite meaning. During the Algerian War, when I and others signed the Manifesto of the 121st, I would have accepted this prize with gratitude, because it would not only have honored me alone, but glorified the cause of freedom for which we fought. But this is not happened, and the prize was awarded to me when the war was already over."
Red wheel
In 1970, Alexander Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature “for the moral strength drawn from the tradition of great Russian literature.” As in the case of Pasternak, the decision of the Swedish committee in the USSR was perceived with hostility. True, there was no pressure on the author of The Gulag Archipelago - they knew it was useless. But they didn’t let me go to the awards ceremony either.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn received the prize, diploma and laureate medal in 1975, after being expelled from the USSR.
In 1973, the Peace Prize was awarded to member of the Politburo of the Vietnamese Workers' Party Le Duc Tho and US Secretary of State Henry Kissenger - for " working together to resolve the Vietnam conflict." Le Duc Tho refused the award, saying that his negotiations with Kissinger and the agreement signed as a result did not put an end to the war. The American accepted the award.
Practical solution
Austrian writer Elfriede Jelinek, who won the 2004 Literature Prize, said that she received the prize undeservedly and refused to go to the presentation ceremony. But she took the money - 10 million Swedish crowns or 1.4 million dollars.
Perelman's axiom
It is impossible not to mention in this series the St. Petersburg mathematician Grigory Perelman, who in 2006 refused the Fields Prize, an analogue of the Nobel Prize, since the Swedish committee does not award mathematicians.
Perelman's Fields Medal was awarded for his proof of the Poincaré conjecture. In 2010, the American Clay Institute, which included the Poincaré hypothesis among the seven problems of the millennium, awarded Perelman a million dollars, but the scientist refused this award as well.
I refused. You know, I had a lot of reasons in both directions. That's why it took me so long to decide. To put it very briefly, then main reason is a disagreement with the organized mathematical community. I don't like their decisions, I think they are unfair. “I believe that the contribution of the American mathematician Hamilton to solving this problem is no less than mine,” Perelman explained.
In 1996, Grigory Perelman refused the youth prize of the European Mathematical Society awarded to him.
Which of the great Russian writers and poets was awarded the Nobel Prize? Mikhail Sholokhov, Ivan Bunin, Boris Pasternak and Joseph Brodsky.
Joseph Brodsky, a poet practically unknown in Russia, suddenly became a laureate of the most prestigious literary prize in the world. What an amazing case!
However, why is it surprising? At first, they wanted to bury Joseph Brodsky in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg, next to the emperors, and then, according to his will, they scattered his ashes over the canals in Naples. So the award is quite natural.
Who now remembers the name of the first winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, who received it in December 1901 - French poet René François Armand Sully-Prudhomme. He is not known, and has never really been known, even in his native France.
And there are plenty of such, to put it mildly, dubious laureates among the Nobel laureates! But at the same time, Mark Twain, Emile Zola, Ibsen, Chekhov, Oscar Wilde and, of course, Leo Tolstoy lived and worked!
When you get acquainted with the long list of writers, in different times noted by the Nobel Committee, you involuntarily catch yourself thinking that you have never heard four names out of every ten. And five of the remaining six are nothing special either. Their “star” works have long been forgotten. The thought naturally comes to mind: it turns out that the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded for some other merit? Judging by the life and work of the same Joseph Brodsky, then yes!
Already after the first dubious award, public opinion in Sweden and other countries was shocked by the decision of the Nobel Academy. A month after the scandalous award, in January 1902, Leo Tolstoy received a protest address from a group of Swedish writers and artists:
“In view of the award of the Nobel Prize for the first time, we, the undersigned writers, artists and critics of Sweden, want to express our admiration to you. We see in you not only the highly revered patriarch of modern literature, but also one of those powerful, soulful poets about whom in this case you should remember first of all, although you, in your personal judgment, never aspired to this kind of reward. We feel the need to address you with this greeting all the more vividly because, in our opinion, the institution that was entrusted with the award of the literary prize does not, in its current composition, represent either the opinions of writers, artists, or public opinion. Let them know abroad that even in our remote country the main and most powerful art is considered to be that which rests on freedom of thought and creativity.” This letter was signed by more than forty prominent figures of Swedish literature and art.
Everyone knew: there is only one writer in the world worthy of being the first to receive the world's highest award. And this is the writer Leo Tolstoy. In addition, it was at the turn of the century that a new brilliant creation writer - the novel “Resurrection,” which Alexander Blok would later call “a testament of the outgoing century to the new.”
On January 24, 1902, an article by the writer August Strindberg appeared in the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet, stating in it that the majority of members of the Academy “are unscrupulous artisans and amateurs in literature, who for some reason are called upon to administer justice, but the concepts of these gentlemen about art are so They are childishly naive that they call poetry only what is written in verse, preferably in rhyme. And if, for example, Tolstoy became forever famous as a depicter of human destinies, if he is the creator of historical frescoes, then he is not considered a poet by them on the grounds that he did not write poetry!
Another judgment on this matter belongs to the famous Danish literary critic Georg Brandes: “Leo Tolstoy belongs to first place among modern writers. No one inspires such a sense of reverence as he does! We can say: no one but him inspires a feeling of reverence. When, at the first award of the Nobel Prize, it was given to a noble and subtle, but second-rate poet, all the best Swedish authors sent an address to Leo Tolstoy for their signatures, in which they protested against such an award of this distinction. It went without saying that it should have belonged to only one thing - the great writer of Russia, for whom they unanimously recognized the right to this prize.”
Numerous appeals and demands for the restoration of outraged justice forced Tolstoy himself to take up his pen: “Dear and respected brothers! I was very pleased that the Nobel Prize was not awarded to me. Firstly, it saved me from a great difficulty - managing this money, which, like any money, in my conviction, can only bring evil; and secondly, it gave me the honor and great pleasure to receive expressions of sympathy from so many people, although unfamiliar to me, but still deeply respected by me. Please accept, dear brothers, my sincere gratitude and best feelings. Leo Tolstoy."
It would seem that this could be the end of the question?! But no! The whole story received an unexpected continuation.
In 1905, Tolstoy's new work, The Great Sin, was published. This, now almost forgotten, acutely journalistic book talked about the difficult lot of the Russian peasantry. Now they don’t remember it also because in this work Tolstoy spoke out in the most categorical form, reasoned and extremely convincingly against private ownership of land.
The Russian Academy of Sciences had a completely understandable idea to nominate Leo Tolstoy for the Nobel Prize. In a note compiled for this purpose by outstanding Russian scientists, academicians A.F. Koni, K.K. Arsenyev and N.P. The Kondakovs gave the highest praise to “War and Peace” and “Resurrection”. And in conclusion, on behalf of the Russian Imperial Academy Sciences expressed a wish to award Tolstoy the Nobel Prize.
This note was also approved by the Class of Fine Literature of the Academy of Sciences - there was such a thing in the Academy at that time organizational structure. On January 19, 1906, along with a copy of Tolstoy’s “The Great Sin,” the note was sent to Sweden.
As soon as he heard about such a great honor, Tolstoy wrote to the Finnish writer Arvid Ernefeld: “If this happened, I would be very unpleasant to refuse, and therefore I very much ask you, if you have - as I think - any connections in Sweden, try to make sure that I am not awarded this prize. Maybe you know one of the members, maybe you can write to the chairman, asking him not to disclose this, so that they don’t do it. I ask you to do what you can so that they do not award me a bonus and do not put me in a very unpleasant position - to refuse it.”
In fact, the Nobel Prize only partially reflects the true merits to humanity of a particular writer, scientist or politician. Nine out of ten Nobel laureates in the field of literature were ordinary artisans from literature and did not leave any noticeable mark on it. And only about one or two out of these ten were truly brilliant.
So why then were the others given bonuses and honors?
The presence of a genius among the awarded gave the award to the rest of the very, very dubious company the illusion of authenticity and deservedness. Apparently, in this most sophisticated way, the Nobel Committee tried and is trying to influence the literary and political preferences of society, the formation of its tastes, affections and, ultimately, neither more nor less, on the worldview of all mankind, on its future.
Remember with what enthusiastic aspiration the majority says: “So-and-so is a Nobel laureate!!!” But the Nobel laureates were not only geniuses who worked for the benefit of people, but also destructive individuals.
So the money bags, through the banker's Nobel Prize, are trying to buy the very soul of the World. Apparently, the great Tolstoy understood this before anyone else - he understood, and did not want his name to be used to endorse such a terrible idea.
Why was the Nobel Prize never awarded to Leo Tolstoy? Most likely, the old man disdained her!