Who will be the next American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature?

If Pynchon doesn't get it..

I've never read her either. Just clicked over to poetryfoundation.org to read a few poems - not bad!

I think I should not be encouraged to grow tomatoes Apparently not, but will have to read more before deciding. All the reading the jury has to do, or is supposed to do---the thought of choosing one author makes my head spin, might as well use a roulette wheel. I dunno, I was okay with Dylan winning. Wondered if Sam Shepard ever would, but then he disqualified. Maybe Patti Smith someday? I mostly know her pages from when she takes them to the stage (most of those that I know are pretty good).

Thinking about the ins and outs of a group of people who, at a point very recently, decided that Kazuo Ishiguro was a good writer, rather than what he is, is a fruitless task.

The only one I've read is Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall, which is scruffier, funnier, shrewder than imposing title had me expecting.

This is one of my favs of hers, from Averno (2006)

Telescope

There is a moment after you move your eye away
when you forget where you are
because you've been living, it seems,
somewhere else, in the silence of the night sky.

You've stopped being here in the world.
You're in a different place,
a place where human life has no meaning.

You're not a creature in a body.
You exist as the stars exist,
participating in their stillness, their immensity.

Then you're in the world again.
At night, on a cold hill,
taking the telescope apart.

You realize afterward
not that the image is false
but the relation is false.

You see again how far away
each thing is from every other thing.

beautiful

Thinking about the ins and outs of a group of people who, at a point very recently, decided that Kazuo Ishiguro was a good writer, rather than what he is, is a fruitless task.

― Gerneten-flüken cake (jed_), Friday, 9 October 2020 02:05 (five hours ago) link

That was far more outrageous than Dylan winning.

Lol

https://slate.com/culture/2017/10/mike-francesa-on-nobel-winner-kazuo-ishiguro.amp?

i think ishiguro is good based on the one novel of his i've read, but i increasingly wonder if there's any point arguing about this stuff

He is fine (def not Nobel worthy to me), but you always wonder the criteria these people have.

Prizes are weird.

I like Gluck’s writing quite a bit, though yeah it is weird to highlight her over any number of her peers of similar quality

But thats awards for you

Lol just about to say That's what awards are for iirc

Thanks for "Telescope," bernard snowy.

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2020/03/12/dario-fo-franca-rame-peoples-clowns/

Good review of a Dario Fo biog. Putting it here as he was another performer like Dylan to win the prize

In his Stanley Crouch obit Ishmael Reed mentioned that the NY literary world was aghast that Toni Morrison won the Nobel instead of Roth

It's important to note that Glück was also the judge of the Yale Younger Poets award from 2003 until quite recently. Her profile as judge, editor, and poet in mainstream letters is about as large as it can be, but I think her name comes to mind for a lot of people simply because of her profile as judge.

Going to be honest: I think her poetry sucks. But it isn't for me, and so I don't really care. Glad she won it...

Though that said, another Louise, namely Louise Erdrich, should win it, IMHO. Her and Gerald Murnane are my two picks for sometime in the next five years.

Long ago Gluck did a week of seminars at my school and seemed to talk mainly about her divorce and watching soap operas all day. I think it was my first hint that even famous poets did not live their lives in artistic transcendence

I like Louise Gluck but was surprised by her win. I had no idea she was this esteemed.

xpost I love Louise Erdrich! I really ought to read her latest, The Night Watchman. I convinced my church book club to read Future Home of the Living God with me early in the pandemic, and it was such a powerful experience to revisit Cedar and her family under these circumstances in the company of other intelligent and kind and terrified people.

Yes, she's so great, and imho, as good a stylist and storyteller as they come.

Article on prizes and poetry which makes some points that reinforce what I was saying about Gluck's role as judge. Turns out that a lot of this is doing favors for people! Who would have thought.

http://asapjournal.com/on-poets-and-prizes-juliana-spahr-and-stephanie-young/

This piece (The Wasteland 100 years on) is not something I care to finish but it starts with Dylan as a literary figure argument (or a version of it). I've not read Ricks' book or anything like that on Dylan.

One hundred years ago literary modernism had its breakthrough success when Boni & Liveright published T.S. Eliot's poem THE WASTE LAND in a commercial edition, with Notes. I wrote about how it happened--and what happened after--for @PoetryFound.https://t.co/Dx3eZlrG8u

— Ryan Ruby (@_ryanruby_) December 12, 2022

Looking forward to reading the piece on Eliot, thanks!

This @_ryanruby_ piece on The Waste Land's centenary is superb, & in its range, variety, attention and bridging of then and now also an implicit defence of literary criticism. (Thanks to @chrisbrooke for drawing my attention to it.) Some thoughts…https://t.co/LGcd7ilK5R

— James B (@piercepenniless) December 18, 2022

That's a really great essay. Have been thinking about it on and off since I read it when it was first linked here (Table, maybe?).

I saw a novel by Conde while browsing and learned of the existence of the Alternative Nobel.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Academy_Prize_in_Literature

Lol @ Rowling among the list of names being put forward.

Kissinger, Peace Prize, etc

happy for all the men on my timeline reveling in their delight that Jon Fosse has won the Nobel

— Morgan Giles モーガン・ジャイルズ (@wrongsreversed) October 5, 2023

Yes, it’s like all men have won the Nobel prize today

I am personally, since I've finally read all the novels of a winner before the announcement

Very deserved imo!

Quite a good essay on Fosse:

https://hopscotchtranslation.com/2022/09/26/septology-and-its-simplistic-complexity/

The Septology is indeed great but if reading a seven-part epic is daunting to new readers the happy news is some of his best novels are his shortest, sometimes sub 100 pages - like Aliss by the Fire and Morning and Evening.

I haven't read a comma of Fosse. Where do I start -- The Septology? I'd prefer a shorter novel.

abcfsk has recommended a short novel..

Lol

why does jon fosse write like ralph wiggum telling a story. like “there was light and it was shining but also dark and also invisible and i saw something but also i wasn’t really seeing it because it saw me and i looked at the picture and something was trapped in the picture and”

— katie kadue (@kukukadoo) June 8, 2023

Sorry, abcfsk, missed your post. Thanks!

Xyzz, are you suggesting that sleep is where Fosse is a viking?

No, he’s a Viking in Norway

So does that mean he's good at being in Norway, or does he merely dream about Norway?

(Alfred Nobel, also a famous Viking of course)

I'll try one of his short ones but idk it does sound the accrual of simpleton repetition over a long period of time is what gives whatever Fosse does it's power over the reader (besides being a Viking)

I've never tried him bcz the passages I have seen on twitter are very annoying.

His style is particular and instantly recognisable across novels (in his plays too, but in slightly different ways) - but as you read them, your attention is very quickly turned towards the tender sweetness at the core of all his character portrayals. The style simply supports that.

septology sounds very much like my shit, looking forward to a copy arriving.

Tarjei Vesaas wuz robbed.

And (among the living) Dag Solstad!

My mate was highly recommending Fosse to me a year ago and I coulda finally been ahead of the trend! Anyways, just started septology and I know I am really going to like this