Norwegian author Jon Fosse awarded 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature

This year’s literature laureate Jon Fosse writes novels heavily pared down to a style that has come to be known as ‘Fosse minimalism’

Norwegian author Jon Fosse, in Stockholm, on October 21, 2021. The Nobel Prize in literature has been awarded to Norwegian author Jon Fosse. | Photo Credit: AP

The 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature is being awarded to Norwegian author Jon Fosse “for his innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable”, the Royal Swedish Academy announced on October 5, 2023.

Literature laureate Fosse’s magnum opus in prose is ‘Septology’ which he completed in 2021: ‘Det andre namnet’ (2019; ‘The Other Name’, 2020), ‘Eg er ein annan’ (2020; ‘I is Another’, 2020) and ‘Eit nytt namn’ (2021; ‘A New Name’, 2021).

Fosse was born in 1959 on the Norwegian west coast. His immense œuvre is written in Norwegian Nynorsk and spans a variety of genres consisting of plays, novels, poetry collections, essays, children’s books and translations.

This year's literature laureate Jon Fosse writes novels heavily pared down to a style that has come to be known as 'Fosse minimalism'.

This can be seen in his second novel 'Stengd gitar' (1985), when Fosse presents us with a harrowing variation on one of his major themes, the… pic.twitter.com/5v1fQ6C6CJ

— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 5, 2023

Last year, the Literature Nobel was awarded to French author Annie Ernaux “for the courage and clinical acuity with which she uncovers the roots, estrangements and collective restraints of personal memory.”

In 2018, the award was postponed after sex abuse allegations rocked the Swedish Academy, which names the Nobel literature committee, and sparked an exodus of members. The academy revamped itself but faced more criticism for giving the 2019 literature award to Austria’s Peter Handke, who has been called an apologist for Serbian war crimes.

The Nobel Prize announcements kicked off on October 2 with the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology granted to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for their “discoveries concerning nucleoside base modification that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.”

This year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry, announced on October 4, was awarded to Moungi G. Bawendi, Louis E. Brus and Alexei I. Ekimov for the discovery and synthesis of quantum dots.

On October 3, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced the winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics which was shared by Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L’Huillier for “experimental methods that generate attosecond pulses of light for the study of electro dynamics in matter.”

The recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on October 6 while the Prize for Economic Sciences will be released on October 9.

The prizes carry a cash award of 10 million Swedish kronor (nearly $900,000) and will be awarded on December 10. The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1895.