The Nobel of Nobels

[Seelig]

As there is a “Booker of Bookers”, I propose to you, dear Readers, prior to this year’s announcement, a shortlist of “Nobel of Nobels”. Let us try to enlist 5 of our favourite books by past laureates (three different categories: poetry, plays and prose). Here are mine:

Poetry:

1. “Complete poetry” (Wislawa Szymborska)
2. “Dignum Est” (Odysseas Elytis)
3. “Omeros” (Derek Walcott)
4. “Residencia en la Tierra” (Pablo Neruda)
5. “Anabase” (Saint-John Perse)

Prose:

1. “The Magic Mountain” (Thomas Mann)
2. “The Stories” (Isaac Bashevis Singer)
3. “Blindness” (José Saramago)
4. “Voices of Chernobyl” (Svetlana Alexievich)
5. “Complete Aphorisms” (Elias Canetti)

Plays:

1. “Waiting for Godot” (Samuel Beckett)
2. “Misterio Bufo” (Dario Fo)
3. “Six characters in search of an author” (Luigi Pirandello)
4. “Long day’s journey into the night” (Eugene O’Neill)
5. “Huis clos” (Jean-Paul Sartre)

 

[redhead]

I'd need to think before I post mine, but while we're at it, we might as well post our favorite laureates if we're doing a "Nobel of Nobels". Mine's Kenzaburo Oe

 

[Liam]

Great idea, and what fun!!

Poetry:

1. Wislawa Szymborska, "Photograph of 9/11"
2. Seamus Heaney, "Digging"
3. Tomas Tranströmer, "Baltics"
4. Joseph Brodsky, "Pilgrims"
5. T. S. Eliot, "Prufrock" (+ The Waste Land)

Prose:

1. Patrick White, Voss
2. Halldor Laxness, Independent People
3. William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury (+ "A Rose for Emily")
4. GGM, One Hundred Years of Solitude
5. Thomas Mann, Death in Venice

Drama:

1. Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot
2. Eugene O'Neill, Long Day's Journey into Night
3. Luigi Pirandello, 6 Characters...
4. Jean-Paul Sartre, No Exit
5. Harold Pinter (not a HUGE fan, but his work is solid), Betrayal (saw this one on stage years ago, with the luminescent Juliette Binoche!)

 

[Ben Jackson]

Let's see:

Poetry:

Odysseus Elytis
Octavio Paz
Eugenio Montale
T.S Eliot
Tomas Transtromer

I tthink one would find it extremely difficult to choose poets. The Swedish Academy knew their onions with their selections after World War Il. From the shortlisted poets alone, one can detect the difficulty in the selection.

Prose (focus on the novel)

Doctor Faustus--- Thomas Mann
Voss-- Patrick White
Sound and the Fury--- William Faulkner
Soul Mountain--- Gao Xingjiang
Golden Notebook--- Doris Lessing

Drama

Madmen and Specialists--- Wole Soyinka
Waiting for Godot--- Samuel Beckett
Long Day's Journey into Night--- Eugene O'Neill
Six Characters in Search of an Author--- Pirandello
The Blind--- Maurice Maeterlinck

I would add non-fiction category (I don't think it's the same as the fiction):

Less Than One---- Joseph Brodsky
Voices of Chernobyl--- Aleixievich
Labyrinth of Solitude--- Octavio Paz
Ake--- Wole Soyinka
Memoirs--- Elias Canetti

 

[Ben Jackson]

Great idea, and what fun!!

Poetry:

1. Wislawa Szymborska
2. Seamus Heaney
3. Tomas Tranströmer
4. Joseph Brodsky
5. T. S. Eliot

Prose:

1. Patrick White
2. Halldor Laxness
3. William Faulkner
4. GGM
5. Thomas Mann

Drama:

1. Samuel Beckett
2. Eugene O'Neill
3. Luigi Pirandello
4. Jean-Paul Sartre
5. Harold Pinter (not a HUGE fan, but his work is solid)

So happy you included Joseph Brodsky, the best Russian poet in the last 30 years of the last century (along with Gennady Ayggi). Very inventive, and in his best poems (like Lullaby of Cape Cod), very visual and expansive.

 

[tiganeasca]

Great idea, and what fun!!

Poetry:

1. Wislawa Szymborska
2. Seamus Heaney
3. Tomas Tranströmer
4. Joseph Brodsky
5. T. S. Eliot

Prose:

1. Patrick White
2. Halldor Laxness
3. William Faulkner
4. GGM
5. Thomas Mann

Drama:

1. Samuel Beckett
2. Eugene O'Neill
3. Luigi Pirandello
4. Jean-Paul Sartre
5. Harold Pinter (not a HUGE fan, but his work is solid)

Um...I do believe the original poster suggested naming specific works. And, honestly, I'd be fascinated to see the names of specific works for the people you listed. I am, in fact, especially looking forward to the works you list for Messrs. Faulkner and Mann.

 

[Leseratte]

My list in any order:
Poetry:
1-Juan Ramón Gimenez-Platero and I(poetic prose)
2-Pablo Neruda-The Book of Questions
3 -Thomas Eliot-The Waste Land
4 -Rabindranath Tagore-Poems (no specific oeuvre)
5-Gabriela Mistral-Poems (no specific oeuvre)

Prose:
1-WilliamFaulkner The Sound and the Fury
2-William Golding Lord of the Flies
3- Olga Tokarczuk- The Books of Jacob
4 -Octavio Paz- El Arco y la Lira
5 -Toni Morrison- The Bluest Eyes

Plays:
1-Samuel Becket-Waiting for Godot
2-Georg Bernhard Shaw-Mrs Warren's Profession
3 -Luigi Pirandelo-Six Characters in Search of an Author
4-Eugene O´Neil-Several plays
5- Sartre-No Exit

 

[tiganeasca]

^Liam:

OOOOOOHHH! I was RIGHT! Fascinating (even if you picked the wrong Faulkner ).

(P.S. On the other hand, since it's "favorite" instead of "best," I guess I can let you slide. This time.)

 

[Liam]

Right about?

 

[Leseratte]

Let's see:

Poetry:

Odysseus Elytis
Octavio Paz
Eugenio Montale
T.S Eliot
Tomas Transtromer

I tthink one would find it extremely difficult to choose poets. The Swedish Academy knew their onions with their selections after World War Il. From the shortlisted poets alone, one can detect the difficulty in the selection.

Prose (focus on the novel)

Doctor Faustus--- Thomas Mann
Voss-- Patrick White
Sound and the Fury--- William Faulkner
Soul Mountain--- Gao Xingjiang
Golden Notebook--- Doris Lessing

Drama

Madmen and Specialists--- Wole Soyinka
Waiting for Godot--- Samuel Beckett
Long Day's Journey into Night--- Eugene O'Neill
Six Characters in Search of an Author--- Pirandello
The Blind--- Maurice Maeterlinck

I would add non-fiction category (I don't think it's the same as the fiction):

Less Than One---- Joseph Brodsky
Voices of Chernobyl--- Aleixievich
Labyrinth of Solitude--- Octavio Paz
Ake--- Wole Soyinka
Memoirs--- Elias Canetti

Like the non fiction category.

 

[tiganeasca]

"Right" in that I believed that your choices would be fascinating. And they WERE!

 

[Liam]

Re: Faulkner: wrong or not, The Sound and the Fury was the first novel by Faulkner I had ever read, it was assigned to us in our AP English class back in 2002 by Ms. Kramer, my favorite teacher (who made HS at least bearable for me). I do think that the first work you read by an author you happen to like leaves a mark like no other. And if it is presented/taught to you by a teacher at the top of her game, well, that just seals the deal, doesn't it?

 

[hayden]

I... will participate. After some thinking.

 

[tiganeasca]

Poetry:
1. Tagore - Gitanjali
2. Yeats - "The Second Coming"
3. Eliot - Four Quartets
4. Kipling - "Recessional" [Yeah, I know. I like it anyway.]
5. Akhmatova - "Requiem" [Okay, so technically she didn't win the Nobel Prize. Tough. I'm putting her down anyway. I like her better than my remaining choices.]

Prose:
1. Jensen - Fall of the King
2. Faulkner - Absalom, Absalom [probably for the same reason Liam listed Sound and the Fury]
3. Laxness - Independent People
4. Mahfouz - Children of Gebelaawi
5. Andric - Bridge Over the Drina

Drama:
[caveat: I have not read enough in this category]
1. O'Neill - "Long Day's Journey Into Night"
2. Heaney - "The Cure at Troy"
3. Hauptmann - "The Weavers"
4. Soyinka - "Death and the King's Horseman"
5. Beckett - "Waiting for Godot"

 

[Ben Jackson]

Poetry:
1. Tagore - Gitanjali
2. Yeats - "The Second Coming"
3. Eliot - Four Quartets
4. Kipling - "Recessional" [Yeah, I know. I like it anyway.]
5. Akhmatova - "Requiem" [Okay, so technically she didn't win the Nobel Prize. Tough. I'm putting her down anyway. I like her better than my remaining choices.]

Prose:
1. Jensen - Fall of the King
2. Faulkner - Absalom, Absalom [probably for the same reason Liam listed Sound and the Fury]
3. Laxness - Independent People
4. Mahfouz - Children of Gebelaawi
5. Andric - Bridge Over the Drina

Drama:
[caveat: I have not read enough in this category]
1. O'Neill - "Long Day's Journey Into Night"
2. Heaney - "The Cure at Troy"
3. Hauptmann - "The Weavers"
4. Soyinka - "Death and the King's Horseman"
5. Beckett - "Waiting for Godot"

In the drama selection, I was torn between picking Death and King's Horseman and Madmen (for Soyinka), but I picked the latter for its daring linguistic accomplishment. Death's great no doubt. Still under-read in drama category as well. I don't know, it seems most of us here struggle to read dramatic works. As for Akhmatova, she could have adorned the Nobel list very well if she had won (still don't know how Sholokhov got it ahead of her). Didn't really like the few poems of Kipling I read, maybe I have to go back to his poetic works in future, as well as Tagore.

 

[Americanreader]

Poetry:
1) Wislawa Szymborska - "First Love"
2) Derek Walcott - "The Star Apple Kingdom"
3) TS Eliot - "The Wasteland"
4) Octavio Paz - "VII from "The Poet's Work"
5) Bob Dylan - "Ain't Talkin"

Drama:

1) Harold Pinter - Betrayal
2) Harold Pinter - Old Times
3) Eugene O'Neill - Long Day's Journey Into Night
4) Samuel Beckett - Krapp's Last Tape
5) Wole Soyinka - Death and the King's Horseman

Prose:

1) William Faulkner - Absalom, Absalom!
2) Gabriel Garcia Marquez - One Hundred Years of Solitude
3) Camilo Jose Cela - San Camilo, 1936
4) Toni Morrison - Beloved
5) Mario Vargas Llosa - Conversation in the Cathedral

 

[Daniel del Real]

I'd need to think before I post mine, but while we're at it, we might as well post our favorite laureates if we're doing a "Nobel of Nobels". Mine's Kenzaburo Oe

I'll also be precise by now; my Nobel of Nobels is, without any doubt, José Saramago.

 

[Hamishe22]

To follow the example of redhead, my favorite laureate and Nobel of Nobels would be W. B. Yeats.

If Jun'ichirō Tanizaki had won a Nobel, my answer would also have been a Japanese novelist.