Nobel Literature winners books from 1901 to date include History of Rome by Theodor Mommsen (1902), In God’s Way by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1903), Beloved and Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison (1993) and The Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek (2004) whose other award-winning book that year was Lust.
Are you looking for the complete list of books written by Nobel Literature winners from the inaugural award to date? Then you are in the right place.
In this post, I will give you the titles of all Nobel Literature winners books. So sit tight while I take you through the list of all the books that have ever won the annual Nobel Prize in Literature with the names of the authors attached.
But first, let’s have a clear understanding of what the Nobel Prize in Literature is. I will also let you in on the origin of the award.
What is the Nobel Prize in Literature?
The Nobel Prize in Literature is among the most prestigious literary awards in the world. It is awarded annually to an individual, regardless of nationality, who has produced outstanding work in the field of literature.
The prize was established by the will of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. The first Nobel Literature Awards were given in 1901.
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Who qualifies to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature?
The Nobel Prize in Literature recognizes and rewards authors, poets, playwrights, essayists, and novelists who have made significant contributions to literature, enriched the literary heritage of humanity, and promoted ideals such as peace, humanism, and understanding among nations.
This award seeks to celebrate literary works that have enduring artistic value and contribute to the advancement of literature as an art form.
Awarding Institution
The Nobel Prize in Literature is awarded by the Swedish Academy. It consists of 18 members elected for life. These individuals assess the nominations and select the laureate based on the significance, originality, and impact of the author’s body of work.
The Nobel Prize in Literature is usually announced in early October each year. It includes a substantial cash award.
Here is another post containing just the names of the authors that have won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Nobel Literature Winners Books
You can now have the list of books that have won the Nobel Prize in Literature from 1901 to date.
From 1901 – 1925
1901 – Sully Prudhomme (France) – “Stances et Poèmes”
1902 – Theodor Mommsen (Germany) – “History of Rome”
1903 – Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (Norway) – “In God’s Way”
1904 – Frédéric Mistral (France) – “Mireio”
1904 – José Echegaray (Spain) – “El Gran Galeoto” and “Santa Juana de Castilla”
1905 – Henryk Sienkiewicz (Poland) – “Quo Vadis”
1906 – Giosuè Carducci (Italy) – Various poetry collections
1907 – Rudyard Kipling (United Kingdom) – “The Jungle Book,” “Kim”
1908 – Rudolf Eucken (Germany) – Various philosophical works
1909 – Selma Lagerlöf (Sweden) – “The Wonderful Adventures of Nils”
1910 – Paul Heyse (Germany) – Various works of fiction
1911 – Maurice Maeterlinck (Belgium) – “The Blue Bird,” “Pelléas and Mélisande”
1912 – Gerhart Hauptmann (Germany) – “The Weavers”
1913 – Rabindranath Tagore (India) – “Gitanjali” (Song Offerings)
1915 – Romain Rolland (France) – “Jean-Christophe”
1916 – Verner von Heidenstam (Sweden) – Various poetry collections
1917 – Karl Gjellerup (Denmark) – “The Pilgrim Kamanita”
1917 – Henrik Pontoppidan (Denmark) – “Lucky Per”
1919 – Carl Spitteler (Switzerland) – “Olympian Spring”
1920 – Knut Hamsun (Norway) – “Growth of the Soil”
1921 – Anatole France (France) – “Penguin Island,” “The Revolt of the Angels”
1922 – Jacinto Benavente (Spain) – Various plays
1923 – William Butler Yeats (Ireland) – “The Tower,” “The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats”
1924 – Władysław Reymont (Poland) – “The Peasants”
1925 – George Bernard Shaw (United Kingdom) – “Pygmalion,” “Saint Joan”
From 1926 – 1950
1926 – Grazia Deledda (Italy) – “Reeds in the Wind”
1927 – Henri Bergson (France) – Various philosophical works
1928 – Sigrid Undset (Norway) – “Kristin Lavransdatter”
1929 – Thomas Mann (Germany) – “Buddenbrooks,” “The Magic Mountain”
1930 – Sinclair Lewis (USA) – “Main Street,” “Babbitt”
1931 – Erik Axel Karlfeldt (Sweden) – Various poetry collections
1932 – John Galsworthy (United Kingdom) – “The Forsyte Saga”
1933 – Ivan Bunin (Russia) – Various works of fiction and poetry
1934 – Luigi Pirandello (Italy) – “Six Characters in Search of an Author,” “The Late Mattia Pascal”
1936 – Eugene O’Neill (USA) – “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” “The Iceman Cometh”
1937 – Roger Martin du Gard (France) – “Les Thibault”
1938 – Pearl S. Buck (USA) – “The Good Earth,” “Sons”
1939 – Frans Eemil Sillanpää (Finland) – “Meek Heritage”
1944 – Johannes V. Jensen (Denmark) – “The Long Journey”
1945 – Gabriela Mistral (Chile) – “Desolation: Poems,” “Lagar”
1946 – Hermann Hesse (Switzerland) – “Siddhartha,” “Steppenwolf”
1947 – André Gide (France) – “The Counterfeiters,” “The Immoralist”
1948 – T.S. Eliot (United Kingdom) – “The Waste Land,” “Four Quartets”
1949 – William Faulkner (USA) – “The Sound and the Fury,” “As I Lay Dying”
1950 – Bertrand Russell (United Kingdom) – Various philosophical works
From 1951 – 1975
1951 – Pär Lagerkvist (Sweden) – “The Dwarf,” “Barabbas”
1952 – François Mauriac (France) – “Thérèse 1951 – ,” “Vipers’ Tangle”
1953 – Winston Churchill (United Kingdom) – “The Second World War”
1954 – Ernest Hemingway (USA) – “The Old Man and the Sea,” “A Farewell to Arms”
1955 – Halldór Laxness (Iceland) – “Independent People”
1956 – Juan Ramón Jiménez (Spain) – “Platero and I”
1957 – Albert Camus (France) – “The Stranger,” “The Plague”
1958 – Boris Pasternak (Russia) – “Doctor Zhivago”
1959 – Salvatore Quasimodo (Italy) – Various poetry collections
1960 – Saint-John Perse (France) – “Anabasis”
1961 – Ivo Andrić (Yugoslavia) – “The Bridge on the Drina”
1962 – John Steinbeck (USA) – “The Grapes of Wrath,” “Of Mice and Men”
1963 – Giorgos Seferis (Greece) – Various poetry collections
1964 – Jean-Paul Sartre (France) – “Nausea,” “No Exit”
1965 – Mikhail Sholokhov (Russia) – “And Quiet Flows the Don”
1966 – Shmuel Yosef Agnon (Israel) – “A Guest for the Night”
1966 – Nelly Sachs (Germany) – Various poetry collections
1967 – Miguel Angel Asturias (Guatemala) – “Men of Maize”
1968 – Yasunari Kawabata (Japan) – “Snow Country,” “Thousand Cranes”
1969 – Samuel Beckett (Ireland) – “Waiting for Godot,” “Endgame”
1970 – Alexandr Solzhenitsyn (Russia) – “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich,” “The Gulag Archipelago”
1971 – Pablo Neruda (Chile) – Various poetry collections
1972 – Heinrich Böll (Germany) – “Billiards at Half-Past Nine,” “The Clown”
1973 – Patrick White (Australia) – “Voss,” “The Tree of Man”
1974 – Eyvind Johnson (Sweden) – “Return to Ithaca”
1974 – Harry Martinson (Sweden) – “Aniara,” “Cape Farewell”
1975 – Eugenio Montale (Italy) – Various poetry collections
From 1976 – 2000
1976 – Saul Bellow (USA) – “Herzog,” “The Adventures of Augie March”
1977 – Vicente Aleixandre (Spain) – Various poetry collections
1978 – Isaac Bashevis Singer (USA) – “S
Certainly, here’s the continuation of the list of Nobel Prize in Literature winners from 1901 to 2001:
1978 – Isaac Bashevis Singer (USA) – “Satan in Goray,” “The Family Moskat”
1979 – Odysseus Elytis (Greece) – Various poetry collections
1980 – Czesław Miłosz (Poland) – “The Captive Mind,” “The Issa Valley”
1981 – Elias Canetti (United Kingdom) – “Auto-da-Fé,” “Crowds and Power”
1982 – Gabriel García Márquez (Colombia) – “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” “Love in the Time of Cholera”
1983 – William Golding (United Kingdom) – “Lord of the Flies,” “The Spire”
1984 – Jaroslav Seifert (Czechoslovakia) – Various poetry collections
1985 – Claude Simon (France) – “The Flanders Road,” “The Grass”
1986 – Wole Soyinka (Nigeria) – “Death and the King’s Horseman,” “The Man Died: Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka”
1987 – Joseph Brodsky (USA) – Various poetry collections
1988 – Naguib Mahfouz (Egypt) – “The Cairo Trilogy,” “Children of Gebelawi”
1989 – Camilo José Cela (Spain) – “The Hive,” “Mazurca for Two Dead Men”
1990 – Octavio Paz (Mexico) – Various poetry collections
1991 – Nadine Gordimer (South Africa) – “Burger’s Daughter,” “July’s People”
1992 – Derek Walcott (Saint Lucia) – Various poetry collections
1993 – Toni Morrison (USA) – “Beloved,” “Song of Solomon”
1994 – Kenzaburō Ōe (Japan) – “A Personal Matter,” “Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids”
1995 – Seamus Heaney (Ireland) – Various poetry collections
1996 – Wisława Szymborska (Poland) – Various poetry collections
1997 – Dario Fo (Italy) – “Accidental Death of an Anarchist,” “Can’t Pay? Won’t Pay!”
1998 – José Saramago (Portugal) – “Blindness,” “The Gospel According to Jesus Christ”
1999 – Günter Grass (Germany) – “The Tin Drum,” “Cat and Mouse”
2000 – Gao Xingjian (China/France) – “Soul Mountain,” “One Man’s Bible”
Nobel Prize in Literature Winners Books From 2001 – 2023
2001 – V. S. Naipaul (United Kingdom/Trinidad and Tobago) – “A House for Mr. Biswas,” “A Bend in the River”
2002 – Imre Kertész (Hungary) – “Fatelessness,” “Kaddish for an Unborn Child”
2003 – J. M. Coetzee (South Africa) – “Disgrace,” “Waiting for the Barbarians”
2004 – Elfriede Jelinek (Austria) – “The Piano Teacher,” “Lust”
2005 – Harold Pinter (United Kingdom) – “The Birthday Party,” “The Homecoming”
2006 – Orhan Pamuk (Turkey) – “My Name is Red,” “Snow”
2007 – Doris Lessing (United Kingdom) – “The Golden Notebook,” “The Grass is Singing”
2008 – Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio (France) – “Desert,” “The Interrogation”
2009 – Herta Müller (Germany/Romania) – “The Land of Green Plums,” “The Appointment”
2010 – Mario Vargas Llosa (Peru) – “The Feast of the Goat,” “The War of the End of the World”
2011 – Tomas Tranströmer (Sweden) – Various poetry collections
2012 – Mo Yan (China) – “Red Sorghum,” “Big Breasts and Wide Hips”
2013 – Alice Munro (Canada) – “Dear Life,” “Runaway”
2014 – Patrick Modiano (France) – “Missing Person,” “Dora Bruder”
2015 – Svetlana Alexievich (Belarus) – “Voices from Chernobyl,” “Second-Hand Time”
2016 – Bob Dylan (USA) – A songwriter, known for his various song lyrics
2017 – Kazuo Ishiguro (United Kingdom) – “Never Let Me Go,” “The Remains of the Day”
2018 – Olga Tokarczuk (Poland) – “Flights,” “Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead”
2019 – Peter Handke (Austria) – “Short Letter, Long Farewell,” “A Sorrow Beyond Dreams”
2020 – Louise Glück (USA) – Various poetry collections
2021 – Abdulrazak Gurnah (Tanzania/United Kingdom) – “Paradise,” “By the Sea”
2022 – Annie Ernaux (France) –
UPDATE FOR 2023 ON OCTOBER 5 2023.
Impact of the Award
Winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature include renowned authors from various countries and literary traditions, and their works often gain international recognition and influence.
The award not only celebrates individual laureates but also helps draw attention to important literary works, encouraging the appreciation and understanding of literature worldwide.
Final Thoughts
Have you noticed that the Nobel Prize in Literature winners books are not always decided? Yes, there are some instances when the prize is not awarded. This may be due to various reasons or controversies. Again, some authors listed above were recognized for their overall body of work and not for specific individual books.
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