Almost the Best Trivia Quiz

Answer: Émile Zola

As only living people can be nominated for any of the Nobel Prizes, Émile Zola was nominated in the first two years of the Prize (1901 and 1902), just before his untimely death. Unfortunately, his style and subject matter were not likely to endear him to the very conservative head of the selection Committee of the Swedish Academy, Carl Wirsén: he found the gritty realism of Zola's work (inspired by Darwin's theory of natural selection) abhorrent and openly clashing with the "idealistic tendency" that Afred Nobel had identified as the chief qualification for a laureate's body of work. The very first Nobel Prize for Literature went to another French writer, Sully Prudhomme - largely forgotten today, but at the time backed by the prestigious French Academy; the 1902 Prize was awarded to German historian Theodor Mommsen.

Much of Zola's fame as a novelist rests on the 20-volume series "Les Rougon-Macquart", the story of a family during the Second French Empire. However, he is also known for having penned an open letter to the President of France (published on January 13 1898 on the newspaper "L'Aurore") in favour of the exoneration of French Army officer Alfred Dreyfus, who had been sentenced to life imprisonment in a penal colony for espionage. The letter began with the words "J'accuse!" (I accuse), which has become synonymous with expressing outrage.

Answer: Leo Tolstoy

Count Leo Tolstoy's body of work and his status in the history of world literature need no introduction. Nominated every year from 1902 to 1906, the great Russian author was also nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1901, 1902 and 1909, and the fact that he was denied a win in all of those occasions is still one of the Prize's great controversies. In 1901 he was widely expected to be nominated - which did not happen, though a large number of Swedish intellectuals sent him a letter expressing their admiration for him and his work, and their dissent from the Committee's decision. The following year, Tolstoy was nominated for the first time, but bitterly opposed by Carl Wirsén because of the Russian author's idiosyncratic political and social views, often labeled as "Christian anarchism".

Sweden's purported anti-Russian sentiment - rooted in centuries of military conflict between the two countries - might have also factored in the decision not to award the Prize to Tolstoy. Tolstoy himself, however, was not interested in the Prize in the least, and in 1906 he reportedly asked the Committee to consider another candidate - which they did, awarding the Prize to Italian poet Giosuč Carducci.

The novel referenced in the question is, of course, "War and Peace" (1869) - a huge work of fiction with a cast of 580 characters, set during the French invasion of Russia by Napoleon's Army.

Answer: Thomas Hardy

As one of the major writers of the late Victorian era, Thomas Hardy should have been a shoe-in for the Nobel Prize in Literature in its early years. His novels and short fiction, mostly set in the fictional English county of Wessex, were all written before the end of the 19th century, when he stopped writing fiction and concentrated on poetry, his first love. Hardy was first nominated for the Nobel Prize in 1910, when he was already 70 years old; he was nominated a further 11 times, the last in 1927 - a year before he passed away. In 1913, with a nomination backed by 97 members of the Royal Society of Literature, Hardy came very close to winning the Prize, but was edged out by Bengali poet Rabindrananath Tagore. Once again, the perceived lack of that "idealistic tendency" worked against Hardy. In 1923, when Hardy (who was already 83 at the time) was seriously considered again, the award went to a younger poet, William Butler Yeats.

On the other hand, Hardy was lucky to have received a number of nominations, as his almost-contemporary Joseph Conrad was not even nominated once - which reportedly angered Ernest Hemingway (winner of the Prize in 1954), a keen admirer of both writers.

The "obscure" hint in the question is a reference to one of Hardy's major novels (and one of the most tragic), "Jude the Obscure" (1895).

Answer: Robert Frost

One of the most popular American poets, the winner of numerous prestigious awards, Robert Frost was one of the many high-profile authors who were repeatedly snubbed by the Nobel Prize Committee. Frost was nominated in 1950 for the first time, and then almost every year until 1963, the year of his death: among his nominators, 1938 Nobel Prize laureate Pearl S. Buck (whose award was controversial), Anglo-American poet W.H. Auden (another frequent nominee who never won), and Irish author C.S. Lewis (of "Narnia" fame). In 1961, it was stated that Frost (86 at the time) was too old to be awarded the prize - a "rule" that in more recent years seems to have thankfully been forgotten.

Robert Frost was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1924, 1931, 1937 and 1943. At the age of 86, he read at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy (20 January 1961).

The Nobel Prize Committee's bias against American writers was unfortunately confirmed in 2008 by one of its members, who made disparaging remarks about American literature being "too isolated, too insular". Though a number of important American authors have received the prize over the years, some of them have proved controversial (above all, Pearl S. Buck, John Steinbeck, and the recent case of Bob Dylan).

Answer: Karen Blixen

At the time of writing, only 16 women writers have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature since its beginnings in 1901, and the list of nominations (at least based on the available records) is also anything but extensive. Among the distinguished ladies whose work went unrewarded, there is Danish author Karen Blixen (known in the English-speaking world by her pseudonym, Isak Dinesen).

Blixen's first Nobel Prize nomination was in 1950, and eight more followed until her death in 1962. In 1959, the Committee decided against awarding her the Prize out of concern for accusations of favoritism towards Scandinavian writers; the Prize eventually went to Italian poet Salvatore Quasimodo. In 1961 she finished in third place behind winner Ivo Andrič and Graham Greene (another major writer who was nominated many times with no luck). She was shortlisted again in 1962, but lost to John Steinbeck, and her death later in that year made her ineligible for the Prize.

Blixen's best-known work is her 1937 memoir "Out of Africa", an account of the seventeen years she spent on a coffee plantation in Kenya. In 1985 the book, originally written in English, was adapted into a successful film directed by Sydney Pollack, and starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. One of her stories, "Babette's Feast" (1958), was also adapted into a film in 1987. Both of these movies won Academy Awards.

Answer: Jorge Luis Borges

Not every author whose Nobel Prize nomination was disregarded was upset about it: some, like Tolstoy, were positively relieved. On the other hand, famed Argentine author Jorge Luis Borges was reportedly quite distressed by his failure to obtain the coveted Prize - especially after coming close twice, in 1965 and 1967. However, like in all areas of life, political bias has often influenced the decisions of the Nobel Committee, and it is likely that Borges paid with repeated snubs his support of infamous dictators such as Chile's Augusto Pinochet and Argentina's Jorge Videla.

First nominated in 1956, Borges one of the top contenders for the 1965 and 1967 Prizes, together with a slew of other high-profile writers. In 1965, the Prize was awarded to Soviet-Russian author Mikhail Sholokov, while in 1967 it went to another Latin American writer, Guatemalan Miguel Ángel Asturias (of very different political bent from Borges). In the final years of his life, Borges had become quite resigned to not being awarded the Nobel Prize, and even joked about it. In 2018, 32 years after the author's death, he was awarded a symbolic Nobel Prize by a group of writers from various parts of the world.

Borges's work, which includes the two influential collections of short stories "Ficciones" and "El Aleph" (published between the 1940s and the 1950s), is considered essential for the development of speculative fiction - in particular the 20th-century Latin American movement known as "magic realism", a literary style that blends supernatural elements with a real-life setting.

Answer: Vladimir Nabokov

Russian-American author Vladimir Nabokov came very close to being awarded the Nobel Prize a number of times. In 1963, the year of his first nomination, a Committee member stated that the author of the scandalous novel "Lolita" (1955) could not be considered for the Prize. However, Nabokov was nominated again, and in 1965 was in the running together with the likes of Pablo Neruda, Jorge Luis Borges, W.H. Auden and Ezra Pound: the prize, however, went to Mikhail Sholokov, who was loyal to the Soviet Union, not an émigré like Nabokov.

According to some sources, in 1974 Nabokov was nominated together with other heavyweights such as Saul Bellow, Graham Greene (another frequent nominee) and, once again, Borges. The Committee made one of its most controversial decisions, awarding the Prize to two Swedes, Harry Martinson and Eyvind Johnson - who happened to be both members of the Swedish Academy, and barely known outside their native country. However, Nobel Prize nominations are shrouded in secrecy for at least 50 years. At the time of writing, the Nomination Archive is searchable only from 1901 to 1966 - meaning that any information about the 1974 nomination process should be taken with a grain of salt.

Answer: Edith Wharton

Known for her realistic portraits of upper-class life in the Gilded Age (of which she had firsthand knowledge), Edith Wharton was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Literature in 1921 for her novel "The Age of Innocence" (1920) - probably her best-known work, adapted in 1993 as a film directed by Martin Scorsese. A talented garden and interior designer as well as an outstanding writer, Wharton was nominated for the Nobel Prize in 1927, 1928 and 1930. Interestingly, the 1928 Laureate was another woman, Norwegian novelist Sigrid Undset - one of the numerous Scandinavian recipients of the Prize. The 1927 winner was French philosopher Henri Bergson, and the 1930 winner her fellow American Sinclair Lewis - who had also been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize won by Wharton in 1921. Wharton felt that Lewis would have been a better fit for the Pulitzer, whose rules mentioned "uplifting American morals". Lewis and Wharton became good friends, and he dedicated his most famous novel, "Babbitt", to her.

As a prolific, successful writer, Wharton was not upset by the Nobel Committee's snubs, though many feel she would have deserved the Prize more than many other recipients.

Answer: E. M. Forster

With an output that includes six novels, various collections of short stories, plays, essays and other writings, Edwin Morgan Forster undoubtedly left his mark on the English literary world. This explains the large number of Nobel Prize nominations he received between 1945 and 1966: however, this was not enough for him to win. Some of the authors who were chosen as Laureates in those 16 separate years were rather controversial, and one of them (Jean-Paul Sartre in 1964) even refused the Prize. One of the reasons why Forster was disregarded may lie in the fact that his last (and most successful) novel, "A Passage to India", had been published in 1924 - over 20 years before his first nomination to the Nobel Prize; then, in the 1950s and 1960s, he was probably considered too aged to became a Laureate.

An interesting detail: in 1954, Forster was nominated by a trio of Oxford professors - one of whom was none other than J.R.R. Tolkien. As these two authors apparently have very little in common, there has been much speculation as to what prompted the author of "The Lord of the Rings" (who was himself unsuccessfully nominated in 1961 by his friend C.S. Lewis) to endorse Forster.

Five out of the six novels written by Forster between 1905 and 1924 were adapted into films, three of which ("A Room With a View", "A Passage to India" and "Howards End") won Academy Awards.

Answer: Ezra Pound

Though Ezra Pound's large poetic output (such as the 800-page epic "Cantos") may be an acquired taste for some, there is no doubt that the eccentric American poet was extremely influential for many poets who were active in the first half of the 20th century. Robert Frost and Nobel Prize laureates W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot were among his collaborators: Eliot dedicated his groundbreaking poem "The Waste Land" to Pound - whom he named "il miglior fabbro" (the better craftsman). Pound had also been instrumental in launching James Joyce's career, and was good friends with Ernest Hemingway.

Unfortunately, Pound's legacy has been tainted by his association with Fascism and his anti-Semitic views - for which he was imprisoned for treason, and later committed to a psychiatric hospital. In spite of his reputation, however, he was nominated nine times between 1955 and 1966 - possibly more, as he passed away in 1972.

By way of conclusion: even if the information available on Nobel Prize in Literature nomination is limited to Prizes awarded more than 50 years ago, a cursory search of the Swedish Academy database will turn up the names of many outstanding writers who missed out on this prestigious award.