Norwegian Jon Fosse wins 2023 Nobel Prize in literature

LONDON

The 2023 Nobel Prize in literature on Thursday has been awarded to Norwegian author Jon Fosse "for his innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable," said the Swedish Academy in Stockholm.


Fosse is renowned for his distinctive style known as “Fosse minimalism.”

This signature style is prominently showcased in his second novel Stengd gitar (1985), in which Fosse presents a “harrowing variation on one of his major themes: the critical moment of irresolution,” the academy said.

In this gripping narrative, a young mother steps out of her apartment to dispose of trash down the chute but inadvertently locks herself out, leaving her baby inside. Caught in a dilemma, she is unable to do so since she cannot abandon her child.

Fosse masterfully portrays this Kafkaesque scenario, yet what sets his work apart is its ability to capture everyday situations that "resonate deeply with our own lives."



“Fosse presents everyday situations that are instantly recognisable from our own lives,” the academy said.

It said Fosse has “much in common with his great precursor in Norwegian Nynorsk literature Tarjei Vesaas.”

“Fosse combines strong local ties, both linguistic and geographic, with modernist artistic techniques. He includes in his Wahlverwandschaften such names as Samuel Beckett, Thomas Bernhard and Georg Trakl,” the academy added.

While Fosse shares the negative outlook of his predecessors, his distinctive “gnostic vision cannot be said to result in a nihilistic contempt of the world,” it said.

“Indeed, there is great warmth and humour in his work, and a naïve vulnerability to his stark images of human experience,” according to the academy.