When Mo Yan of China was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature today, thousands of reasonably well-read people around the world (including me) asked themselves the following question. “Who?”
So as a public service, I am pleased to present the “Winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature” quiz!
There are two ways to play this game: Quick and Super Extra Special. For the Quick game, simply read though the list of the 50 most recent winners below and mark a tick on a piece of scrap paper every time you don’t recognize a name. At the end, count them up.
For the Super Extra Special game, print out the list below and mark one of the following four words next to each name.
1. Yes. You believe the writer deserved to win the Nobel Prize.
2. Okay. You believe it was not unreasonable for the writer to win the Nobel Prize.
3. Huh? You have no idea why the writer won the Nobel Prize.
4. Who? You have no idea who the writer is.
Award yourself 1 point for each Yes, Okay, or Huh? you mark. Subtract 1 point for every Who? you mark.
Subtract an additional 1 point (for a total of 2 points) for every Who? you mark next to a winner who wrote in English. These writers are indicated with asterisks.
However, award yourself 3 bonus points each (for a possible total of 9 points) if you want to insist that Beckett wrote in French or Singer in Yiddish or Brodsky in Russian. No cheating!
You win if you achieve a positive score. I scored minus 8 points on the Super Extra Special quiz and I’m not feeling very good about myself. I hope you do better.
2012 – Mo Yan
2011 – Tomas Tranströmer
2010 – Mario Vargas Llosa
2009 – Herta Müller
2008 – Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio
2007 – Doris Lessing ***
2006 – Orhan Pamuk
2005 – Harold Pinter ***
2004 – Elfriede Jelinek
2003 – J. M. Coetzee ***
2002 – Imre Kertész
2001 – V. S. Naipaul ***
2000 – Gao Xingjian
1999 – Günter Grass
1998 – José Saramago
1997 – Dario Fo
1996 – Wislawa Szymborska
1995 – Seamus Heaney ***
1994 – Kenzaburo Oe
1993 – Toni Morrison ***
1992 – Derek Walcott ***
1991 – Nadine Gordimer ***
1990 – Octavio Paz
1989 – Camilo José Cela
1988 – Naguib Mahfouz
1987 – Joseph Brodsky ***
1986 – Wole Soyinka
1985 – Claude Simon
1984 – Jaroslav Seifert
1983 – William Golding ***
1982 – Gabriel García Márquez
1981 – Elias Canetti
1980 – Czeslaw Milosz
1979 – Odysseus Elytis
1978 – Isaac Bashevis Singer ***
1977 – Vicente Aleixandre
1976 – Saul Bellow ***
1975 – Eugenio Montale
1974 – Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson
1973 – Patrick White ***
1972 – Heinrich Böll
1971 – Pablo Neruda
1970 – Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
1969 – Samuel Beckett ***
1968 – Yasunari Kawabata
1967 – Miguel Angel Asturias
1966 – Shmuel Agnon, Nelly Sachs
1965 – Mikhail Sholokhov
1964 – Jean-Paul Sartre
1963 – Giorgos Seferis
Peter Galen Massey 
I am very depressed on minus 20 and think I will go back to bed! I admit that when I heard that Mo Yan had been awarded the Prize, my first reaction was that it was more political than literary.
I haven’t read yet the explanation for the prize, and I haven’t read Yan, so I’m in no position to judge. There do seem to be distribution requirements, by culture, language, and nation, no two European writers in English in a row, for example, which I don’t have a problem with. The original instructions that the winner should bestow the greatest benefit to mankind in an ideal direction seems more political, because that seems to have tilted the prize more heavily toward second tier writers who deal overtly with political or social issues than I would like. But it’s the Swedes game and they can set the rules they like.