1916 Nobel Prize in Literature

Verner von Heidenstam was the leader of the generation of poets of the 1890s that regenerated Swedish poetry. His first collection of poems Vallfart och vandringsår ("Pilgrimage: The Wander Years", 1888), which contains predominantly Oriental themes, marked a new epoch in the modern literature of Sweden. A new form of poetry characterized by rich imagination and the worship of beauty in contrast to the gloomy realistic school which had been dominant in Swedish literature before. In major works such as Hans Alienus (1892) and especially in Dikter ("Poems", 1895) Heidenstam opens perspectives to an inner life.

He was later noted for patriotic poetry linked to Swedish history in works such as Ett folk ("One People", 1902) and the prose poems in Karolinerna ("The Charles Men", 1897–98). These were followed by major works such as the epic historical prose work Folkunga Trädet ("The Tree of the Folkungs", 1905–07) including Folke Filbyter and Bjälboarvet ("The Bjälbo Inheritance"). In 1915, the year before Heidenstam was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, another aspect of his writing appeared in Nya dikter ("New poems"), a collection of mainly philosophical poems.^[2]

The decision to award Heidenstam, himself a member of the awarding institution the Swedish Academy, as the second Swedish Nobel laureate in just seven years provoked mixed reactions. The Swedish press was generally positive to the choice of Heidenstam, but internationally it was heavily criticized by many observers.^[7][8] The decision to award Heidenstam has been seen as a result of the strong tendency of nationalism in Sweden at the time.^[9]