The Swedish Academy announced today, Thursday, that Norwegian author Jon Fosse, a professor of Scandinavian literature, has won the Nobel Prize in Literature 2023, for a wide range of works that include plays, novels, and children's books.

Fosse commented in a statement issued by his publishing house, Samlaget, saying: "I see this as a prize for literature that aims first and foremost to be literature, without any other considerations, I am very grateful."

The Nobel Prize in Literature follows the recent announcements of the Nobel Prizes in Peace and Economics during the consecutive weeks at the beginning of October.

The 2023 Nobel Prize has the highest monetary value in Swedish currency in the history of Nobel Prizes, which were established over 100 years ago, and is shared if more than one person wins.

This year, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences raised the value of the 2023 Nobel Prize to 11 million Swedish kronor “about a million US dollars,” obtained from the will left by its inventor, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel. Winners also receive an 18-carat gold medal and a diploma at the awards ceremony in December.

Jon Fosse is one of the most prominent playwrights in his country, having written around 40 plays in addition to novels, short stories, children's books, poetry, and essays.

The Swedish Academy, which awards the prize, stated that it is "for his innovative plays and prose that gives voice to what cannot be said."

Anders Olsson, chair of the Nobel Committee for Literature, stated that Fosse's work is rooted "in the language and nature of his Norwegian background."

Matts Malm, the permanent secretary of the academy, contacted Fosse by phone to inform him of his win. He said the author was driving in the countryside and promised to drive home carefully.

Who is Jon Fosse, the Nobel Prize in Literature winner?

One of the most important writers in Europe, he began his career nearly 40 years ago, during which he wrote novels, plays, poems, stories, essays, and children's books, and his award-winning works have been translated into over 50 languages, with his plays performed more than a thousand times worldwide.

He is considered one of the most important contemporary Norwegian writers, and his novel "Fosse Trilogy" won the "Nordic Council Literature Prize," the highest award for Scandinavian literature, awarded to novels published in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Finland.

He has received many awards, such as the Nordic Council Literature Prize, the Duborg Literature Prize, the Order of St. Olav as a Knight Commander for his contributions to literature, the National Order of Merit, and the Prague Prize.

Nobel Prize in Literature 2023
He follows in the footsteps of Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1903, Knut Hamsun in 1920, and Sigrid Undset in 1928, becoming the fourth Norwegian writer "Fosse" to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Last year, French author Annie Ernaux won the prize for what the Swedish Academy called "the courage and clinical sharpness" of books rooted in her background in her small hometown in the Normandy region of northwest France.

Ernaux was the seventeenth woman among 119 Nobel Prize winners in Literature. The literary prize has faced long-standing criticism for focusing too much on European and North American writers, as well as its male dominance.

In 2018, the prize was postponed after allegations of sexual assault shook the Swedish Academy, known as the Nobel Committee for Literature, causing a mass exodus of members, and in 2019 the prize was awarded to Austrian Peter Handke, who is dubbed an advocate for Serbian war crimes.