I read every Nobel Literature Prize winner from 1913 to 1921, and this is what I found

It is the third week of my reading challenge - to read all 120 winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature before the 2024 winner is announced.
In week three of the 120 Nobels reading challenge I introduce you to the Nobel Prizes stained by World War One - from Rolland in 1915 to France in 1921.
What do these great writers have to do with war and peace, fascism and socialism, and with some of the most notorious people in world history?
More details, links to all texts and resources are available at my substack - jeffrich.subst.... Free to join.
My 120 Nobels Challenge series on substack will show you how the Nobel Prize is a window onto on understanding the world history, world literature and geopolitics.
You can chat with me about the 120 Nobels Reading Challenge on the Burning Archive channel KZbin channel comments section and more exclusively at jeffrich.subst...
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Check out ‪@NobelPrize‬ for more details about the process of choosing the Nobel Prize for Literature and profiles of the winners.

[@srenottohansen8193]

Great content, Jeff Rich. True, Karl Gjellerup is living in total oblivion today. Pontoppidan, however, is still read, much loved, and his three great novels are still published in new editions.

[@Toggitryggva]

Earlier this year I read a massive three volume book on Hamsun's Treason trial, by Thorkild Hansen. Written in danish and probably.not available in english. A truly great piece of writing, very sympathetic to Hamsun, but also quite revealing about the extent of his and his families' Nazi sympathies. The chapter about Hamsun's 1943 meeting with Hitler, to try to get the german governor of Norway replaced is just chilling. I also read Hamsun's last book, Paa gjengrodde stier (On Overgrown paths) that he wrote during his house-arrest and while he was being eveluated in a psychiatric hospital. A great piece of writing, that makes the case of his „diminished mental capacities“ rather silly. A last trivia note on Hamsun: My country's only Nobel Laureate wrote his most acclaimed novel as a direct refutation of the message of Hamsun's Growth of the Soil. Or so he sometimes claimed.

[@jackinkol1835]

I'm definitely going to be seeking out the work of Henrik Pontoppidan; fantastic video!

[@MegaFount]

Your description of the Dreyfus case is not accurate. He is not like Assange at all. He was a French officer who was wrongly accused and convicted of treason. He was sent to Devil’s Island. Emile Zola took up his case and fought to have him exonerated which he eventually was. It’s not like Assange as Dreyfus was loyal to France, an assimilated Jew who was set up because he was a Jew. There are a number of great films made about this case over the years, Paul Muni as Zola, I Accuse with Jose Ferrer as Dreyfus, and a recent film by Roman Polanski which has been suppressed by political forces.

[@theburningarchive]

This is all true. I guess I was thinking more how the case of Assange is an emblematic case of injustice that polarises people.

[@MegaFount]

⁠the problem is that Assange did what he was accused of, whereas, Dreyfus was completely and utterly innocent. There’s no comparison really. In Assange’s case, it’s a question of whether he is the one culpable as he just posted state secrets that were leaked to him. He didn’t steal them himself but released them to the world. It’s a question of where the actual crime lies. Dreyfus, on the other hand, had absolutely nothing to do with the state secrets that were stolen and was wrongly accused, convicted and sentenced to a harsh penalty. If anything, I would think it’s comparable to what is being done to Donald Trump.

[@battybibliophile-Clare]

The problem with Carl Spittler's book is it is printed in a Gothic Script font, and most German speakers find t difficult to read, as it went out of use pre-WWII, I think. I can just about make it out. It's a great shame that he hasn't been translated.

[@cyberpunkalphamale]

I do this with Hugo, Nebula, Philip K. Dick, and Pulitzer prizes.

[@abooswalehmosafeer173]

Loving it.

[@MegaFount]

I love your style. The Geoffrey Rush of literature and history.

[@theburningarchive]

Thank you, what a wonderful compliment!