Nobels

[LARSSON at vax1.mankato.msus.edu]

I know virtually nothing about Seamus Heany, this year's winner, but one
thing that the Nobel committees have historically done is lean toward
writers who are philosophically Significant (Thomas Mann, Saul Bellow) or
Socially Responsible (consider Americans Pearl Buck, Sinclair Lewis, and
John Steinbeck).  Writers who are also innovative in *literary* terms
sometimes get the award when they also fall in one of the other categories
(Garcia Marquez, Toni Morrison).  But the list of non-Nobel winners is long:
Joyce and Nabokov among them.


Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)