Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prizes are prizes instituted by the will of Alfred Nobel, awarded to people (and also to organizations in the case of the Nobel Peace Prize) who have done outstanding research, invented groundbreaking techniques or equipment, or made outstanding contributions to society. The Nobel Prizes, which are generally awarded annually in the categories listed below, are widely regarded as the supreme commendation in the world today.

As of November 2005, a total of 776 Nobel Prizes have been awarded (758 to individuals and 18 to organizations). However, a few prize winners have declined the award. There are years in which one or more prizes are not awarded; however, the prizes must be awarded at least once every five years. During World War II for instance no prizes were awarded in any category from 1940 through 1942. The selection of the peace prize in particular was greatly hampered by Nazi Germany's occupation of Norway.[1] The prize cannot be revoked. Nominees must be living at the time of nomination and, since 1974, the award may not be given out posthumously.

Prize categories

Category	Characteristics
Nobel Prize in Physics	Awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to "the person who shall have made the most important discovery or invention within the field of physics".
Nobel Prize in Chemistry	Awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to "the person who shall have made the most important chemical discovery or improvement".
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine	Awarded by the Karolinska Institutet to "the person who shall have made the most important discovery within the domain of physiology or medicine".
Nobel Prize in Literature	Awarded by the Swedish Academy to "the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work of an idealistic tendency".
Nobel Prize in Peace	Awarded by the Norwegian Nobel Committee to "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity among nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses".
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics	Also known as the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, it was instituted in 1969 by Sveriges Riksbank, the Bank of Sweden. Although it is awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences with the official Nobel prizes, it is not paid for by his money, and is technically not a Nobel Prize.

Awarding ceremonies

Stockholm Concert Hall, where the awarding ceremonies for the Nobel Prizes are held annually

The committees and institutions that serve as selection boards for the prizes typically announce the names of the laureates in October. The prizes are awarded at formal ceremonies held annually on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death.

The peace prize ceremony was held at the Norwegian Nobel Institute from 1905 until 1946, later at the Aula of the University of Oslo, and since 1990 at the Oslo City Hall. The other prize ceremonies were held at the Stockholm Concert Hall as of 2005.

Each award can be given to a maximum of three recipients per year. Each prize constitutes a gold medal, a diploma, and a sum of money. The monetary award is currently about 10 million Swedish Kronor (slightly more than one million Euros or about 1.3 million US dollars). This was originally intended to allow laureates to continue working or researching without the pressures of raising money. In actual fact, many prize winners have retired before winning. If there are two winners in one category, the award money is split equally between them. If there are three winners, the awarding committee has the option of splitting the prize money equally among all three, or awarding half of the prize money to one recipient and one-quarter to each of the other two. It is common for the recipients to donate the prize money to benefit scientific, cultural or humanitarian causes.

Since 1902, the King of Sweden has formally awarded all the prizes, except the Nobel Peace Prize, in Stockholm. King Oscar II initially did not approve of awarding grand national prizes to foreigners, but is said to have changed his mind after realising the publicity value of the prizes for the country.

The first Nobel Peace Prize was awarded in 1901, given by the President of Norwegian Parliament until the Norwegian Nobel Committee was established in 1904. Its five members are appointed by the Norwegian Parliament (the Stortinget), and it is entrusted both with the preparatory work related to prize adjudication and with the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize. Its members are independent and do not answer to lawmakers. Members of the Norwegian government are not allowed to take any part in it.

Nobel's will

Alfred Nobel

The prizes were instituted by the final will of Alfred Nobel, a Swedish chemist, industrialist, and the inventor of dynamite. Alfred Nobel wrote several wills during his lifetime. The last one was written on November 27, 1895—a little over a year before he died. He signed it at the Swedish-Norwegian Club in Paris on November 27, 1895. Nobel's work had directly involved the creation of explosives, and he became increasingly uneasy with the military usage of his inventions. It is said that this was motivated in part by his reading of a premature obituary of himself, published in error by a French newspaper on the occasion of the death of Nobel's brother Ludvig, and which condemned Alfred as a "merchant of death." So in his will, Alfred left 94% of his worth to the establishment of five prizes:

The whole of my remaining realizable estate shall be dealt with in the following way:

The capital shall be invested by my executors in safe securities and shall constitute a fund, the interest on which shall be annually distributed in the form of prizes to those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind. The said interest shall be divided into five equal parts, which shall be apportioned as follows: one part to the person who shall have made the most important discovery or invention within the field of physics; one part to the person who shall have made the most important chemical discovery or improvement; one part to the person who shall have made the most important discovery within the domain of physiology or medicine; one part to the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work of an idealistic tendency; and one part to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity among nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.

The prizes for physics and chemistry shall be awarded by the Swedish Academy of Sciences; that for physiological or medical works by the Caroline Institute in Stockholm; that for literature by the Academy in Stockholm; and that for champions of peace by a committee of five persons to be elected by the Norwegian Storting. It is my express wish that in awarding the prizes no consideration whatever shall be given to the nationality of the candidates, so that the most worthy shall receive the prize, whether he be a Scandinavian or not.

Although Nobel's will established the prizes, his plan was incomplete and, due to various other hurdles, it was five years before the Nobel Foundation could be established and the first prizes awarded on December 10, 1901.

Nomination and selection process

File:Nobel prize medal.jpg

Nobel Prize Medals

As compared with some other prizes, the Nobel prize nomination and selection process is long and rigorous. This is an important reason why the Prizes have grown in importance and prestige over the years to become the most important prizes in their field.

Forms, which amount to a personal and exclusive invitation, are sent to about 3000 selected individuals to invite them to submit nominations. For example the Nobel Foundation states that in the case of the peace prize the following people may nominate:

• Members of national assemblies and governments of states
• Members of international courts
• University rectors
• Professors of social sciences, history, philosophy, law and theology
• Directors of peace research institutes and foreign policy institutes
• Persons who have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
• Board members of organisations who have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
• Active and former members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee
• Former advisers appointed by the Norwegian Nobel Institute

Similar requirements are in place for the other prizes.

The strictly enforced submission deadline for nominations is January 31. Self-nominations are automatically disqualified and only living persons are eligible for the Nobel Prize.

Unlike many other awards, the Nobel Prize nominees are never publicly announced, and they are not supposed to be told that they were ever considered for the prize. These records are sealed for 50 years.

After the nomination deadline, a Committee compiles and screens the nominations to a list of around 200 preliminary candidates. The list is sent to selected experts in the field of each nominee's work and the list is shortened to around 15 final candidates. The Committee then writes a report with recommendations and sends it to the Academy or other corresponding institution, depending on the prize. As an example of institute size, the Assembly for the Prize for Medicine has 50 members. The members of the institution meet and vote to select the winner(s).

The process varies slightly between the different disciplines. For instance, Literature is rarely awarded to collaborators but the other prizes often involve multiple names.

No posthumous nominations

Posthumous nominations for the Prize are not allowed. This has sometimes sparked criticism that people deserving of a Nobel Prize did not receive the award because they died before being nominated. In two cases the Prize has been awarded posthumously to people who were nominated when they were still alive. This was the case with UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld (1961, Peace Prize) and Erik Axel Karlfeldt (1931, Literature) — both of whom were awarded the prize in the years they died.

Since 1974, awards have not been allowed for a deceased person. William Vickrey (1996, Economics) died before he could receive the prize, but after it was announced.

Nobel Prize in Literature

The Nobel Prize in Literature is awarded annually to an author from any country who has, in the words of Alfred Nobel, produced "the most outstanding work of an idealistic tendency". The "work" in this case generally refers to an author's work as a whole, not to any individual work, though individual works are sometimes cited in the awards. The Swedish Academy decides who, if anyone, will receive the prize in any given year and announces the name of the chosen laureate in early October.

The original citation of this Nobel Prize has led to much controversy. In the original Swedish, the word idealisk can be translated as either "idealistic" or "ideal". In earlier years the Nobel Committee stuck closely to the intent of the will, and left out certain world-renowned writers such as Leo Tolstoy and Henrik Ibsen for the Prize, probably because their works were not "idealistic" enough. In later years the wording is interpreted much more liberally, and the Prize is awarded, as is often argued that it should be, for lasting literary merit. The choice of the Academy can still generate controversy, particularly for the selection of lesser-known writers (or writers working in avant garde forms) such as Dario Fo in 1997 and Elfriede Jelinek in 2004.

The Nobel Prize is not the sole measure of literary excellence and lasting worth. Critics of the prize point out that many prominent writers have failed to be cited or even nominated for the award.

Nomination procedure

Each year the Swedish Academy sends out requests for nominations of candidates for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Members of the Academy, members of literature academies and societies, professors of literature and language, former Nobel literature laureates, and the presidents of writers' organizations are all allowed to nominate a candidate. However, it is not possible to nominate oneself.

Thousands of requests are sent out each year, and about fifty proposals are returned. These proposals must be received by the Academy by February 1, after which they are examined by the Nobel Committee. By April, the Academy narrows the field to around twenty candidates, and by summer the list is reduced further to some five names. In October that year, members of the Academy vote, and the candidate who receives more than half the number of votes is named the Nobel Laureate in Literature. The process is similar to those of other Nobel Prizes.

The prize money of the Nobel Prize has been fluctuating since its inauguration but as present stands at 10 million Swedish krona. The winner also wins a gold medal and a Nobel diploma.

Controversy

The Prize in Literature has a history of controversial awards. From 1901 to 1912 the committee was characterized by an interpretation of the "ideal direction" stated in Nobel's will as a "a lofty and sound idealism", which led to Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen and Émile Zola being rejected. During World War I and its immediate aftermath, the committee adopted a policy of neutrality, favouring writers from non-combatant countries.

It has been suggested that Auden's poorly received (yet bestselling) translation to 1961 Peace Prize winner Dag Hammarskjöld's Vägmärken ("Markings"), coupled with statements made by Auden during a Scandinavian lecture tour suggesting that Hammarskjöld was homosexual (as was Auden), put paid to Auden's chances of receiving the prize.

In 1974 Graham Greene, Vladimir Nabokov, and Saul Bellow were considered, but passed over for a joint award to Swedish authors, Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson, both Nobel judges themselves. Bellow would win the prize in 1976; neither Greene nor Nabokov were honoured.

The award to Dario Fo in 1997 was initially considered "rather lightweight" by some critics, as he was seen primarily as a performer and had previously been censured by the Roman Catholic Church. According to Fo's London publisher, Salman Rushdie and Arthur Miller were favourites to win that year, but the organisers stated that they would have been "too predictable, too popular".

The choice of the 2004 winner, Elfriede Jelinek, drew criticism from within the academy itself. Knut Ahnlund (who had not played an active role in the academy since 1996) resigned saying that picking Jelinek had caused "irreparable damage" to the award's reputation.

Trivia

• The oldest person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature was Theodor Mommsen, who was 85 when he received the Prize in 1902. The youngest was Rudyard Kipling, who was 42 when he won the Prize in 1907.

• Mommsen was also the Nobel laureate born earliest (November 30, 1817). He was born nearly 129 years before the most recently born laureate, Elfriede Jelinek (October 20, 1946).

• The longest-lived laureate in literature to date is Bertrand Russell, who was 97 when he died. The oldest living laureate is Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, currently 87 years old (born in 1918). The shortest-lived laureate was Albert Camus, who died in a car crash at the age of 46, three years after receiving the award.

• TV and radio personality Gert Fylking started the tradition of shouting 'Äntligen!' (Swedish for 'At last!') at the announcing of the award winner, as a protest to the academies constant nomination of "authors more or less unknown to the general public". Fylking has since agreed to stop his prank, but the tradition has been carried on by others.

Nobel Prize in Economics

The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (Swedish: Sveriges Riksbanks pris i ekonomisk vetenskap till Alfred Nobels minne) is a prize awarded each year for outstanding intellectual contributions in the field of economics. The award was instituted by the Bank of Sweden (the world's oldest central bank) at its 300th anniversary in 1968. Although it was not one of the awards established in the will of Alfred Nobel, the economics laureates receive their diploma and gold medal from the Swedish monarch at the same December 10 ceremony in Stockholm as the Nobel laureates in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature. The amount of money awarded to the economics laureates is also equal to that of the other prizes.

The prestige of the prize derives in part from its association with the awards created by Alfred Nobel's will, an association which has often been a source of controversy. The prize is commonly referred to as the Nobel Prize in Economics or, more correctly, as the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics.

In February 1995, it was decided that the economics prize be essentially defined as a prize in social sciences, opening the Nobel Prize to great contributions in fields like political science, psychology, and sociology. Also, the Economics Prize Committee was changed to require two non-economists to decide the prize each year, whereas previously the prize committee had consisted of five economists.

Award process

The economics laureates, as with the laureates in chemistry and physics, are chosen by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Nominations of about one hundred living persons are made each year by qualified nominators and are received by a five to eight member committee, which then submits its choice of winners to the Nobel Assembly for its final approval. As with the other prizes, no more than three people can share the prize for a given year and they must be living at the time the prize is awarded. The final award is made in Stockholm and is accompanied by a prize (as of 2006, 10 million Kronor; roughly 1 million euros).

Controversy

Controversy stems from a few questions:

1. May its affiliation with the Nobel name, despite not being part of Alfred Nobel's bequest, be justified by the similarity of the award process?
2. Have there been any systematic political biases?
3. Is objective evaluation of candidates more difficult for a social science like economics, relative to physics, chemistry, medicine, literature or peace?

Among the most vocal critics of the economics prize is Peter Nobel who is a peripheral member of the Nobel family – his paternal grandfather's grandmother was one of the daughters of Alfred Nobel's elder brother Ludvig.

Nobel Peace Prize

File:PearsonPeacePrize.jpg

Lester B. Pearson after accepting the Nobel Peace Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize is one of five Nobel Prizes bequested by the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel. Nobel's inventions including dynamite and Ballistite led to the death of millions of people, so he created the Nobel Prizes in an effort to make up for these perceived evils. According to Nobel's will, the Peace Prize should be awarded "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses".

The Peace Prize is awarded annually in Oslo, the capital of Norway, unlike the prizes in economics, physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature, which are awarded in Stockholm, Sweden. For the past decade, the Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony at the Oslo City Hall has been followed the next day by the Nobel Peace Prize Concert, which is broadcast to over 150 countries and more than 450 million households around the world. The Concert has received worldwide fame and the participation of top celebrity hosts and performers. The selection of Nobel Prize winners sometimes causes controversy. In the case of the Peace Prize, controversial winners include former warmongers and former terrorists whom the Committee may select for exceptional concessions in the attempt to achieve peace.

Appointment process

The Nobel Institute in Oslo, Norway.

The Norwegian Parliament appoints the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which selects the Laureate for the Peace Prize. The Committee chairman, currently Dr. Ole Danbolt Mjøs, awards the Prize itself. At the time of Alfred Nobel's death Sweden and Norway were in a personal union in which the Swedish government was solely responsible for foreign policy, and the Norwegian Parliament was responsible only for Norwegian domestic policy. Alfred Nobel never explained [2] why he wanted a Norwegian rather than Swedish body to award the Peace Prize. As a consequence, many people have speculated about Nobel's intentions. For instance, Nobel may have wanted to prevent the manipulation of the selection process by foreign powers, and as Norway did not have any foreign policy, the Norwegian government could not be influenced.

Nominations

Nobel Peace Prize Winners the Dalai Lama & Bishop Tutu. Vancouver, Canada, 2004. Photo by Carey Linde

Nominations for the Prize may be made by a broad array of qualified individuals, including former recipients, members of national assemblies and congresses, university professors, international judges, and special advisors to the Prize Committee. In some years as many as 199 nominations have been received. The Committee keeps the nominations secret and asks that nominators do the same. Over time many individuals have become known as "Nobel Peace Prize Nominees", but this designation has no official standing [3]. Nominations from 1901 to 1951, however, have been released in a database. When the past nominations were released it was discovered that Adolf Hitler was nominated in 1939, though the nomination was retracted in February of the same year. Other infamous nominees included Joseph Stalin and Benito Mussolini.

Unlike the other Nobel Prizes, the Nobel Peace Prize may be awarded to persons or organizations that are in the process of resolving an issue, or creating world peace rather than upon the resolution of the issue. Since the Prize can be given to individuals involved in ongoing peace processes, some of the awards now appear, with hindsight, questionable, particularly when those processes failed to bear lasting fruit. For example, the awards given to Theodore Roosevelt, Shimon Peres, Yasser Arafat, Lê Ðức Thọ, and Henry Kissinger were particularly controversial and criticized; the latter prompted two dissenting Committee members to resign [4]. Right-leaning groups have also criticized the Nobel Committee for a perceived left-leaning bias in its decisions.

In 2005, the Nobel Peace Center opened. It serves to present the Laureates, their work for peace, and the ongoing problems of war and conflict around the world.

Controversy

The Nobel Peace Prize has throughout its history sparked controversy. The Norwegian Parliament appoints the Peace Prize Committee, but pacifist critics argue that the same Parliament has pursued partisan military aims by ratifying membership in NATO in 1949, by hosting NATO troops, and by leasing ports and territorial waters to US ballistic missile submarines in 1983. However, the Parliament has no say in the award issue. A member of the Committee cannot at the same time be a member of the Parliament, and the Committee includes former members from all major parties, including those parties that oppose NATO membership.

A particular claimed weakness of the Nobel Peace Prize awarding process is the swiftness of recognition. The scientific and literary Nobel Prizes are usually issued in retrospect, often two or three decades after the intellectual achievement, thus representing a time-proven confirmation and balance of approval by the established academic community, seldom contradicted by newer developments. In contrast, the Nobel Peace Prize at times takes the form of summary judgment, being issued in the same year as or the year immediately following the political act. Some commentators have suggested that to award a peace prize on the basis of unquantifiable contemporary opinion is unjust or possibly erroneous, especially as many of the judges cannot themselves be said to be impartial observers. The 20th Century fight against Communism is one example that stands out most noticeably in this regard. This situation may be said to deprive the 'real' peace makers, who may not be recognized for their long-term or subtle approaches. However, others have pointed to the uniqueness of the Peace Prize in that its high profile can often focus world attention on particular problems and possibly aid in the peace-efforts themselves.

On closer inspection, the peace-laureates often have a lifetime's history of working at and promoting humanitarian issues, as in the examples of German medic Albert Schweitzer (1952 laureate), Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., an African-American Christian civil rights activist (1964 laureate); Mother Teresa, a Catholic missionary nun (1979 laureate); and Aung San Suu Kyi, a Buddhist nonviolent pro-democracy activist (1991 laureate). Still others are selected for tireless efforts, as in the examples of Jimmy Carter and Mohamed ElBaradei. Others, even today, are quite controversial, due to the recipient's political activity, as in the case of Henry Kissinger (1973 laureate), Mikhail Gorbachev (1990 laureate) or Yasser Arafat (1994 laureate) (whose Fatah movement began, and still serves, as a terrorist organization). Finally, the Peace Prize draws criticism for candidates whom it overlooks, such as Mahatma Gandhi, Pope John XXIII, Steve Biko, Hélder Câmara, Raphael Lemkin and Oscar Romero.

Criticism of the prize

The Prize has been criticized over the years, with people suggesting that formal agreements and name recognition are more important than actual achievements in the process of deciding who is awarded the Prize. Perhaps the most infamous case of this was in 1973 when Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho shared the Peace Prize for bringing peace to Vietnam, even though the War in Vietnam was ongoing at the time. Le Duc Tho declined the award, for the stated reason that peace had not been achieved. There has also been widespread criticism of the 1994 Peace Prize award to Yasser Arafat.

Failure to recognise similar achievements

It is said that Mahatma Gandhi was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize five times in between 1937 to 1948 but indeed never won it. Research indicates that the Authority was probably planning to give him the award in 1948; however, he was assassinated in that year. The committee reportedly considered a posthumous award but ultimately decided against it, instead choosing not to award the Nobel Peace Prize to anybody for that particular year.

The strict rules against a Prize being awarded to more than three people at once is also a cause for controversy. Where a prize is awarded to recognise an achievement by a team of more than three collaborators, inevitably one or more will miss out. For example, in 2002, a Prize was awarded to Koichi Tanaka and John Fenn for the development of mass spectrometry in protein chemistry, failing to recognise the achievements of Franz Hillenkamp and Michael Karas of the Institute for Physical and Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Frankfurt.

Similarly, the rule against posthumous prizes often fails to recognise important achievements by a collaborator who happens to have died before the prize is awarded. For example, Rosalind Franklin made some of the key developments into the discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953, but she died of ovarian cancer in 1958 and the Prize was awarded to Francis Crick, James D. Watson and Maurice Wilkins (one of Franklin's collaborators) in 1962.

Criticism was levied towards the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics, specifically the recognition of Roy Glauber and not George Sudarshan for the award. Arguably, Sudarshan's work is the more accepted of the two. Though Glauber did publish his work first in 1963, Sudarshan's work later that same year is the work upon which most of quantum optics is based.

Lack of a mathematics prize

There are several possible reasons why Nobel created no Prize for mathematics. Nobel's will speaks of prizes for those inventions or discoveries of greatest practical benefit to mankind, possibly having in mind practical rather than theoretical works. Mathematics was not considered a practical science from which humanity could benefit, a key purpose for the Nobel Foundation.

One other possible reason was that there was already a well known Scandinavian prize for mathematicians. The existing mathematical awards at the time were mainly due to the work of Gösta Mittag-Leffler, who founded the Acta Mathematica, a century later still one of the world's leading mathematical journals. Through his influence in Stockholm he persuaded King Oscar II to endow prize competitions and honor distinguished mathematicians all over Europe, including Hermite, Bertrand, Weierstrass, and Poincaré.

It is often repeated that Nobel refused to endow a mathematics prize because his wife had an affair with Mittag-Leffler. This story is patently untrue, as Nobel never married.

In 2001, the government of Norway began awarding the Abel Prize, specifically with the intention of being a substitute for the missing mathematics Nobel. Beginning in 2004, the Shaw Prize, which resembles the Nobel Prize, included an award in mathematical sciences. The Fields Medal is often described as the "Nobel Prize of mathematics", but the comparison is not very apt because the Fields is limited to mathematicians not over forty years old.

Like the science Nobels, the Crafoord Prize in mathematics is awarded by the Swedish Royal Academy. It is generally considered the mathematics equivalent of the Nobel prize in the sciences.

Trivia

Marie Skłodowska-Curie, the first two-time Nobel laureate in history

In the history of the Nobel Prize, there have been only four people to have received two Nobel Prizes. Those are:

• Marie Skłodowska-Curie

Physics [1903]: Discovery of Radioactivity

Chemistry [1911]: Isolation of Pure Radium

• Linus Pauling

Chemistry [1954]: Hybridized Orbital Theory

Peace [1962]: Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty Activism

• John Bardeen

Physics [1956]: Invention of Transistor

Physics [1972]: Theory of Superconductivity

• Frederick Sanger

Chemistry [1958]: Structure of the Insulin Molecule

Chemistry [1980]: Virus Nucleotide Sequencing

Additionally, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1917, 1944, and 1963. The first two prizes were specifically in recognition of the group's work during the world wars.

Only one person has the distinction of being an Oscar winner and a Nobel Laureate. The Irishman, George Bernard Shaw winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1925 won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay in 1938.

Other prizes

There are several other well known international prizes and awards in various fields of endeavour; including fields without a Nobel prize, most of which are not as well-known. The best known include the Fields Medal, the Turing Award, the Templeton Prize, and the Wolf Prize. The Templeton Prize is the largest financial annual prize award given to a single person for intellectual merit, worth 795,000 pounds sterling or 1.4 million US dollars in 2006.

External links

• Nobelprize.org — Official site
• The Nobel Prize Internet Archive
• Why is there no Nobel in computer science?
• Why is there no Nobel in mathematics?
• The Nobel Committees of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
• The Nobel Committee of the Karolinska Institute
• The Swedish Academy
• The Norwegian Nobel Committee
• Britannica Spotlight: Guide to the Nobel Prizes
• CNN: Nobel Centennial
• Nobel Prize in English Literature — awards to Indian-English writers

• Norwegian Nobel Committee
• The Nomination Database for the Nobel Prize in Peace, 1901-1951
• Nobel Prize for Peace Better World Links

• Laureates at the Nobel foundation
• Winners of the Prize in Economics
• History of the prize and its controversy

• The Nobel Prize in Literature - Laureates
• Nobel Prize Winners in Literature
• The Nobel Prize
• Written in Stone - Burial locations of literary figures.

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