Yanks Too Narrow For Nobel

Nobel judge attacks 'ignorant' US literature
Alison Flood
guardian.co.uk,

The Nobel prospects of Philip Roth and Joyce Carol Oates may have been dashed after the prize's top jury member described American writing as insular and ignorant.
Permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy Horace Engdahl told the Associated Press that US writers were "too sensitive to trends in their own mass culture", which he said dragged down the quality of their work. "The US is too isolated, too insular. They don't translate enough and don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature," Engdahl said. "That ignorance is restraining."
"Of course there is powerful literature in all big cultures, but you can't get away from the fact that Europe still is the centre of the literary world ... not the United States," he said, later adding that "what I said expresses a conviction resulting from more than 10 years of assiduous labour". Toni Morrison was the last American to win the prize, in 1993.
Contacted by guardian.co.uk this morning, Engdahl claimed a misunderstanding had occurred and that the Swedish Academy strictly adhered to Alfred Nobel's wish "that in awarding the prize no consideration whatsoever be given to the nationality of the candidates". He added: "It is of no importance, when we judge American candidates, how any of us views American literature as a whole in comparison with other literatures. The Nobel prize is not a contest between nations but an award to individual authors. It is essential to remember that when national feelings run high." He maintained that there was "no reason for any particular author to get upset by my observations.
This year's winner is expected to be announced in the next few weeks and has not yet been selected, according to Engdahl, who told AP that "it could take some time" before the academy settles on a name.
Engdahl, a professor of Scandinavian literature and a literary critic, has been permanent secretary since 1997 of the secretive committee of 18 Academy members who select the winner. Over the course of a year, the Academy will whittle down nominated authors from 200 to a shortlist of five, which is not made public. An author must receive more than half of votes cast to take the prize.
Ladbrokes' frontrunner is currently the Italian scholar Claudio Magris, who is 3/1 favourite to take the SEK10m prize, trailed by the Syrian poet Adonis at 4/1. Joyce Carol Oates and Philip Roth are the highest placed Americans, at 7/1, while Don DeLillo is at 10/1 and Thomas Pynchon at 20/1; Ladbrokes is also offering 40/1 odds on the generally reclusive Pynchon both winning and attending the prize-giving on December 10.
Last year's winner was the UK's Doris Lessing, a rare female choice. Over the last 10 years the Nobel laureates have had a distinct European flavour, with Turkey's Orhan Pamuk, the UK's Harold Pinter and VS Naipaul, Austria's Elfriede Jelinek, Portugal's José Saramago, Hungary's Imre Kertész, France's Gao Xingjian and Germany's Günter Grass all taking the prize. South Africa's JM Coetzee won in 2003.
In 2005, Knut Ahnlund, a member of the Nobel committee, resigned over the choice of Elfriede Jelinek as winner, describing her writing as "whining, unenjoyable public pornography". Engdahl gave no indication as to what he might do should an American author take the prize this year.