Page 32 - ARUBA TODAY

A32 FEATURE
Wednesday 2 May 2018
Will there be a Nobel in literature this year? Stay tuned

By JARI TANNER and JAN M. the husband of poet Kata-
OLSEN rina Frostenson, an acad-
COPENHAGEN, Denmark emy member.
(AP) — For the first time Last fall, a leading Swed-
since 1943, there's a nota- ish newspaper published
ble risk that no Nobel Prize sexual misconduct claims
in literature will be award- from 18 women against Ar-
ed this year. nault, who runs a cultural
And that's not because center the academy used
the world's authors, poets, to help fund. The 71-year-
essayists and other writers old Arnault has denied the
have been found wanting. allegations, but police say
The painful, though not they are investigating some
unprecedented possibil- of them.
ity arises from sex abuse Swedish daily newspaper
and financial crimes scan- Svenska Dagbladet first
dals involving the Swedish reported the multiple al-
Academy, the body that legations against Arnault
chooses the Nobel litera- last year. In April, the news-
ture winner. paper published a story al-
The august academy has leging that Arnault pawed
admitted that "unaccept- Sweden's Crown Princess
able behavior in the form Victoria 12 years ago, let-
of unwanted intimacy" took In this file photo dated Friday, April 17, 2015, a national library employee shows the gold Nobel ting his hand slide from her
place within its ranks, but its Prize medal awarded to the late novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez, in Bogota, Colombia. neck to her rear. One of
handling of unseemly alle- Associated Press the princess' aides quickly
gations has shredded the removed the hand, the
body's credibility, called The latest defection, an- cel awarding the prize this were presented. In 1935, no paper said, citing three un-
into question its judgment nounced Saturday, has left year — because it's in no literature candidate was named sources.
and forced its first female the prestigious institution shape to pick a winner. An- deemed worthy of a No- Arnault also has been sus-
leader to resign. with only 11 people to con- ders Olsson, the permanent
A debate over how to face sider who should win the secretary of the academy,
up to its flaws also divided 2018 Nobel Prize in litera- hinted at that scenario in
its 18 members — who are ture. remarks to Swedish public
appointed for life — into At its upcoming weekly broadcaster SR last week.
hostile camps and prompt- meeting in Stockholm If the academy does go
ed seven members to leave on Thursday, the Swed- ahead and choose a win-
or disassociate themselves ish Academy could de- ner for 2018, some experts
from the secretive group. cide to postpone or can- say the laureate's accom-
plishments could be taint-
ed or overshadowed by a
mess they had no hand in
creating.
"It really depends on who
gets it. That person needs
to know what the acad-
emy has gone through and
maybe respond to the cri-
sis," Mads Rosendahl Thom- In this file photo dated Thursday Oct. 5, 2017, Sara Danius, Per-
sen, a literature professor manent Secretary of the Swedish Academy prepares to an-
with Denmark's Aarhus Uni- nounce the 2017 Nobel Prize in Literature at the Grand Hall of
the Old Stock Exchange in Stockholm, Sweden.
versity, said. Associated Press
The world's most prestigious
prizes in science, medicine,
literature and peacemak- bel, but winners were cho- pected of violating centu-
ing have been withheld 49 sen in the other fields. ry-old Nobel rules by leak-
times in all since the honors Science and medicine No- ing names of winners of the
based on the will of Swed- bels have been awarded prestigious award — alleg-
ish inventor Alfred Nobel every year since 1942 but edly seven times, starting
began in 1901. the Peace Prize was not in 1996. It was not clear to
No Nobel prizes at all were given in 1972. The eco- whom the names were al-
awarded during the World nomics prize, which is not legedly disclosed.
War II years of 1940-42. The directly related to Nobel's Some male academy
Nobel literature prize was will, began in 1968 and has members tried to force
not given out on seven oc- never not been awarded Frostenson out for her hus-
casions so far: 1914, 1918, annually. band's alleged misdeeds
1935 and 1940-43. The Swedish Academy's in- and announced they
In 1914, 1918 and 1943, ternal feud was triggered would not remain part of
In this Dec. 20, 2017 file photo Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria neither the peace prize by a sex-abuse scandal the group when the vote
looks on during the Swedish Academy's annual meeting at the nor the literature prize was linked to Jean-Claude Ar- on their motion failed. For
Old Stock Exchange building in Stockholm, Sweden.
Associated Press conferred, while the sci- nault, a major cultural fig- technical reasons, they
ence and medicine prizes ure in Sweden who is also can't actually resign. q